


Mercury Rising

by spinner33



Series: CM - Close to Canon [44]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: M/M, Trigger Warning for Murder Memories, Trigger Warning for Rape Memories, Trigger Warning for War Memories, trigger warning for child abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-06
Updated: 2015-12-06
Packaged: 2018-05-05 07:29:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 30,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5366510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spinner33/pseuds/spinner33
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story runs concurrently with Mercury Falling.   </p><p>The unsub strikes up an understanding with the federal agent that he kidnapped.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Edward Trovinger

**Author's Note:**

> The first eight chapters are from Ed Trovinger's POV. The last eight chapters are from April Davies' POV.

  
__

"Those who don’t build must burn.” - Ray Bradbury

1.5 – Ed Trovinger

Nov 20 – 11 a.m.

 

I’ve been waiting long enough that I’m worried. Where is Dr. Ramirez? He said to meet him here, right here. I’m sure he said right here. He was very specific. Outside the U.S. Botanic Garden and Conservatory, next to the Reflecting Pool, in front of the Capitol Building. He chose such an outdoor public area because he was nervous, but he could not have been more nervous than I was. I didn’t know if I was ready for this. It was the right thing to do, but I was so afraid. 

Had something happened to Dr. Ramirez? Where could he be? I pulled out my phone to check his last email, to confirm the time and the place. While I was holding my phone, it beeped. I held my breath and waited for the message to open. 

Get out now. I was right. They know. Goodbye. Godspeed – RR 

A horrible chill took my spine. I put the phone back in my pocket, and leapt up. Trembling, I walked directly back to my car where it was parked at the head of the curve, next to the solemn statuary. Although I was hoping not to draw attention to myself, I could feel the electronic eyes on me. There were cameras everywhere. I searched my pocket for my keys, and got inside the car, knowing it was time to implement the alternate plan. 

I rustled around in the pages in the passenger seat. What had happened to Dr. Ramirez? What had happened to him? I could feel it swelling up around me, the worry and the fear, the guilt of knowing I might be responsible for whatever had befallen him. I couldn’t help myself. I was worried about him, and worried about myself. He was my last hope. Or at least, maybe, I don’t know. Sergeant Price might be able to help too. 

I pulled out the sheets I had printed last night, when I first started to be afraid that this meeting might fall through. It’s always prudent to have an alternate plan, and Sergeant Price was my alternate plan. I turned over the ignition, and thought about the drive ahead. Williamsburg? It was going to take more than three hours to get there. No matter. The problem was what to do with my own car in the meantime. 

Dr. Ramirez – what had happened to him? What had he been right about? Had they taken him out, destroyed him after all, just as he had feared they would? All these months he had been convinced the other members of his department were conspiring together to get him fired. They must have succeeded. That was it. That had to be the answer. That had to be why he wasn’t here to meet me. They had destroyed him, just as he had feared they would. 

Well, if those bastards were going to destroy him, I was going to destroy them. Down to the last. 

 


	2. Dr. Reid's House

2.5 – Dr. Reid’s House (Nov 21 – 6 a.m.)

 

I held my breath and sat quietly in the cold car. There was no one around to see me. Everyone was asleep, as they should be. Slowly, though, the morning lights came on, first this house, then that house, then the next. It wasn’t a bad place, this neighborhood. I wondered if Sergeant Price would have lived in a neighborhood like this if his wife’s job hadn’t kept them in Williamsburg. 

Their vehicle was comfortable. I could almost smell the happiness and contentment in their lives—coffee, aftershave, perfume, dog toys, apple juice, togetherness. The seats were worn, but comfortable. Price was a tall man. I had had to adjust the seat several times, and it kept sliding back. He and his wife must have taken turns driving their car, always adjusting the driver’s seat. It didn’t want to stay in the position I had placed it in. I rustled around under the seat, looking for the handle again, and found a small black box. It rattled when I picked it up. I carefully opened it, and a sad smile crept onto my face. 

The Sergeant had bought his wife earrings for Christmas. I was touched for a moment before the jealousy and the guilt set in. I needed to give these back. He meant for her to have them. I needed to give them back. 

I put the earring box down in the passenger seat, and watched in the side-view mirror as the light came on upstairs in the house that concerned me. 5645 Three Feathers. Amazing what a little computer research will turn up. You could find anyone you wanted to find if you knew where to look. 

Dr. Reid must have been awake – must have been in the bathroom. A yellow-gold burst of radiant energy came to life, not unlike the two explosions I had already witnessed this morning. Two of the traitors who had destroyed Dr. Ramirez were gone, and two remained. Dr. Ramirez would be pleased, I hoped, except perhaps for the unfortunate, unnecessary collateral damage of Dr. Rockford’s son. I shouldn’t have done that. I shouldn’t have. I should have waited until the young man went back in the house for his school books. I should have waited. But Dr. Ramirez would forgive me, I hoped, because my intentions had been pure even if the execution of my plan had not been what I had hoped. They had to pay for how they had treated Dr. Ramirez, and they had to pay with what was most dear to them. Rockford had paid with his son’s life if not his own. 

Dr. Larsson’s death had been quick, as I had planned. At least something had gone right! Although she had to be punished, but there was no need to cause unnecessary pain. No need to be cruel. No need to cause someone to linger in agony. She was gone, and it had been fast, and that was the end of that. Her debt had been paid. I considered her forgiven, her sins washed clean. 

A portly man with gray hair emerged from the rear of the residence, and I was taken aback. I knew Dr. Reid was a young man. Who was this? The gray haired man leaned on the doctor’s car, and I held my breath. The lead wire. What if he jostled the lead wire? Damn it! Get off the car! That wire had popped off three time already. Once on the table at home. Once while riding in the box in the car. Once while I was putting the device under Dr. Reid’s car. What if this clumsy, lumbering fool knocked it loose again? I frowned at his reflection, but he took no notice. He seemed to have enough to frown about on his own without me troubling him further. 

The front door popped open at last, and I caught my breath when a young boy walked out, his face full of sleep. The man leaning on the car stood up, and called out to him. I wasn’t close enough to hear their words, only to know they were speaking. 

Another figure appeared on the porch, carrying a mug in one hand. He was young, with long, light-brown hair. I glanced to the passenger seat and shuffled pages. This man matched the picture I had found online of Dr. Spencer Reid. He set the mug down on the porch long enough to slip on gloves, then picked the mug up again. He slung a messenger bag over one shoulder, and tossed a set of keys to the man who had been leaning on the side of his car. 

The man caught the keys, and I studied the figures before the porch. Dr. Reid was speaking to the young boy. He ran his fingers through the child’s hair, smiled at him lovingly. The boy hurried down the porch. I stopped. 

If the child got in the car, the deal was off, I promised myself. No matter what. If the little boy got in the car, I was going to drive away. I wasn’t going to kill a child. I wouldn’t do it. Not again. I felt bad enough about Dr. Rockford’s son, not bad for Rockford, but bad for his son. I would find another way to kill Dr. Reid, one that did not involve hurting an innocent child. I would not, I could not, kill another child. 

The man to whom Dr. Reid had tossed the keys called out to the boy, voicing his disapproval at the fact the boy wasn’t wearing a coat. The boy stopped where he was, and looked to Dr. Reid, who smiled at him again, and nodded. The boy hurried back up the stairs and went inside the house. I sighed with relief, picked up my phone, and prepared to dial the numbers which would connect with the device underneath the hood. I prayed that the lumbering oaf had not jostled the lead wire away. 

Please, God, please smile on me today. 

Dr. Reid lingered by the steps, sipping from his mug, waiting for the boy, no doubt. A skinny black cat, almost entirely black but for one white leg, raced over the porch and down the steps, darting past the waiting doctor. Reid frowned at the cat but made no move to chase the beast. I hoped it went around the house towards the back yard. No need to hurt an innocent animal. I waited until I was sure the cat had made it around the house and vanished. 

The gray haired man got in the car, slid the keys into the ignition. Oh damn. When he turned the key, the clicking of the starter gave off sparks near enough to my device under the hood to make even me nervous. Flames began to lick out from under the hood. The lead wire must have fallen off again. I wasn’t sure the device would engage now even if I did hit the send button! 

Dr. Reid dropped his mug and his bag, and shot forward. I was so surprised that all I could do was watch. Dr. Ramirez had said Dr. Reid was an arrogant, self-centered, self-serving creature who spent his days spying on others, recording their actions, reporting to his shadow masters once the day was done. But there the doctor was, rushing forward to the car, yanking open the door, putting himself in harm’s way. 

This wasn’t possible. A selfish man concerned only with himself would have run the other direction, would have hidden in the house. He would not have thrown himself headlong into the face of danger this way. I confess I was startled by his heroism. I didn't often find myself questioning God's messengers, but I wondered if Dr. Ramirez had been wrong about Dr. Reid. Had Dr. Ramirez been a false messenger?

I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I continued to watch, my thumb hovering over the send button. Dr. Reid struggled to pull the older man out of the car, in spite of the fact the portly fellow was fighting him every step of the way, gouging and punching at the doctor for his efforts. I couldn’t decide whether to be annoyed or amused. Dr. Reid was pulling the other man away from the car with all his might. He was intent on saving the man’s life even as the flames rose high enough that the man inside the car could finally see what the doctor was so upset about. The gray haired man spotted the flames, stopped fighting, and hurried out of the car. 

I couldn’t delay any longer – now or never. I pressed the send button. The antique Volvo went up in a ball of golden light and red flames and black smoke. I started my car (no, the Sergeant’s car) and drove off, watching acrid, black smoke billowing in the air behind. Car alarms were going off around the neighborhood. Several neighbors spilled out of their houses. As I pulled away, the curtain on the house across the street was yanked open. No surprise. I would have been shocked if the neighbors hadn’t noticed the explosion. I couldn’t linger. I had other things to do.


	3. The Messenger

3.5 – The Messenger (Nov 21 – 9 a.m.)

 

What to do? Agent Davies doesn’t own a car. 

I searched around the apartment parking garage, and found her space number. A bike rack was bolted down in the slot, with an old ten-speed locked in place. The layer of dust on the bike indicated it hadn’t been ridden in a long time. So Davies must take the train to work? 

I shivered as I pictured the explosion that had occurred at Dr. Rockford’s house, and then the one at Dr. Reid’s house. Both of them had had cars parked in their driveways, which had meant easy access to the vehicles, as well as easy terrain to find a vantage point from which to engage the device and then watch the explosion. I had been looking forward to seeing what kind of explosion would occur at Agent Davies’ residence, looking forward to the cathartic release the explosion would bring. I had never demolished a parking garage before. I must admit, I was left bereft by this unseemly turn of events.

Another thought seized me as I sat there pondering the unfairness of it all. If Davies took the train, she might already have left! I couldn’t sit here pouting, or I might miss my chance altogether. 

I pulled Sergeant Price’s vehicle into the parking space, at least as far as I could go and not damage the bike or the bike rack. I gathered my gun and my keys (the Sergeant’s keys) and locked the car, then walked towards the entrance from the apartment complex to the parking garage. My knees were shaking. I hoped no one would take notice of the vehicle parked there. No one should notice it. It was non-descript and average and normal. No one should notice it at all. 

“Oh! Pardon me! I’m so sorry!” 

I glanced up at the voice. A young woman popped out of the blue door and gasped when she encountered me there. She dropped her purse. I bent down and helped her retrieve the items that fell out – a cell phone, a pen, a lipstick, an earring. 

“Sorry, ma’am,” I said gushed, grabbing the door and holding it open for her. She rolled a briefcase with wheels out, and ducked her head as she apologized again, almost cringing away from me. 

“Sorry. I wasn’t looking.”

“That’s all right. Take care,” I called. 

She waved as she hurried towards her vehicle, in the opposite direction from where I had parked. She climbed in and drove away. I was certain she wouldn’t remember the incident if questioned later. She had hardly glanced up at me, hardly seen my face. I felt a rush of guilty relief and delight as I realized I was holding the door open yet. God was smiling on me today after all. 

I ducked inside and let the portal close before glancing around the staircase. There was one camera nestled up in a far corner of the ceiling, but it was too far away to either get a good picture of me, or for me to destroy with a bullet. So I put myself into a normal posture and jogged up the steps. 

As luck would have it, further proof that God was watching over me this morning, a door to the third floor opened. Another woman popped out onto the stairs. I stepped behind the door and grabbed it, holding it open for her, hiding myself behind it. She raced down the stairs, clutching her coat and bag, not looking back. Two gone. I didn’t have a picture of Agent Davies, so I could only hope that neither one of the women who had left already was the one I needed to find. 

I hurried along the corridor of the apartment complex – it was a modern, clean, tidy place. Very well kept. I would have expected better security in such a facility though. They were willing to put in all the amenities – a pool I could see out the window, a gym I had seen listed on the placard outside the elevators (on the fifth floor with views of the city!), a common area lounge with large screen TVs. Why would they spend all this money on building such a comfortable place and not install more video cameras? Odds were that nothing would happen in such a safe place, but the reality of life is that the odds are not always in your favor. 

I found the correct apartment – Davies had written her first initial and last name on the plate beside the doorbell. I leaned my head against the door, gouging myself in the cheek with the Thanksgiving wreath that was hung there, masking too much of the view hole. The wreath was hung with dark red berries and autumn leaves, with two small apples leaning against each other at the center. I could hear the shower running, and I could smell coffee brewing. 

I took out my knife and let myself in. What money had been lavished on adding a gym and a pool had been garnered from purchasing and installing the cheapest door locks. I supposed they must have reasoned that the outside building was so safe that inside security would have been unnecessary, a mute point. I wondered how Agent Davies’ death was going to influence them to reconsider that erroneous conclusion. 

I stepped inside her modestly-furnished apartment, and felt a pang in my heart. She had a stitched embroidery sampler hung on the wall next to the door. The hand-wrought design proclaimed ‘Cleanliness is next to Godliness’. Tucked inside the frame with the yellowed sampler was a picture of a very young girl, perhaps four or five, perhaps as young as Olive Price was. She had long braids to either side of her head, big brown eyes, and a broad, friendly smile. Next to her was a woman in her late sixties, with her long gray hair pleated in the same fashion as the little girl’s was. As I stared at them, I knew they must be related – they had the same nose, the same eyes, the same smile. 

Olive’s smile from yesterday lingered in my brain as I stared at the picture, and wondered who I was going to encounter around the turn. Agent Davies clearly had taken the sampler’s advice to heart. Her apartment was spotless. Her kitchen was gleaming. Her purse and work folders were stacked by the door, ready for transport. The couch had embroidered pillows. There was an afghan laid over the chair, folded once, twice, carefully placed. 

There was another embroidery sample on the far wall. I stepped towards it into the kitchen, drawn by the smell of the coffee and my curiosity. 

 

To every thing, there is a season.

A time to every purpose under Heaven.

 

I was admiring the tiny autumn leaves which were dotted around the rust-red words. Ecclesiastes. The next passage was blue with small snowflakes, the next pink with tulips, the last green with tiny sweet pea vines and pods. Had Davies made these? They were really quite nice. 

When a small silver device plugged in along the wall, a device I had at first mistaken for an air freshener, turned from silver to red, and emitted a loud buzz. Even as I felt a stab of fear, I thought approving thoughts about this young woman, for taking safety issues into her own hands. Good for her!

The shower turned off. A voice called. 

“Petru? Esta cah teeneh?” (Peter? Is that you?)

I slowly put away my knife, then reached out and pulled the noisy silver buzzer from the wall plug. 

“Petru?” she called out again. “I have to go to work.” 

She stepped into the hallway, and into the kitchen, where she stopped. I put the sensor down on the counter, put my hands behind my back, lifted my gun out of my waistband. 

I stared at her. She stared at me. It was the girl from the picture by the door, a grown woman now. She was not smiling. The braids were gone. Her short hair was wet, lying neatly against her skull and her neck. Her face was serious, filled with concern. She was in the process of pulling on a bathrobe, but the surprise of encountering me had caused her to stop. I gasped and kept my eyes on her face, embarrassed by her nakedness. A glittering chain around her neck caught my eye.

A golden cross lay against her pale skin. 

I waited, holding my breath. What was this? Was this a sign? 

“Can I help you? Are you lost?” she asked finally. No scream. No anger. No rage. She pulled her robe closed and waited for my answer. 

“Yes,” I said, voice quavering, knees shaking. She nodded once. I pulled out my gun and pointed it at her. I waited for her to scream. She did not. “You need to come with me,” I said. She nodded again, slowly. 

“Can I get dressed first?”

“No,” I insisted, cocking the weapon. “We have to leave now. There’s no time.” 

She stared evenly at me. I motioned her towards the door, and she obeyed. I saw her glance up at her purse on the table by the door. She put up a hand as if to pick it up, then paused, and dropped her hand. 

“Will I need it?” she asked. 

“No,” I replied. She left the purse where it was. I opened the door and we walked out into the hallway. I pulled the door closed tightly.


	4. God's Plan

4.5 – God’s Plan (Nov 21 – 4:00 p.m.)

 

By dinnertime, I had been questioning myself over and over for several hours. What had I done? What was I thinking? Had I finally lost my mind?

We made it to the vehicle without incident. We made it out of the city as well. Agent Davies sat quietly in the passenger side of the SUV, and I saw her eyes moving around her, careful not to stare at me, but taking in the printed pages in the floorboard which I had pushed out of her way to allow her to sit down. I was certain she had taken in the names and the locations, the pertinent information. She could see that I had printed off the addresses of everyone in Dr. Ramirez’s department, including herself. She said nothing. I said nothing. I continued to drive. I drove for several hours, not knowing what to do. There really wasn't anything to do but go home. 

Once back at my modest house, we spent several hours testing each other. I sat in one of the two chairs at the small table in the dining area, and she sat on the divan, which was no more than five feet away from the table. I watched her. She watched me. Neither of us spoke. I put away my gun because sitting there staring at her, pointing the gun at her, it made me feel embarrassed and ashamed. 

What had I done? More importantly, what was I going to do now?! 

Rain had been falling since mid-afternoon. It was getting dark because of the cloud cover. It was getting chilly too. Davies fidgeted, if only a bit. I folded my hands together and waited. She cleared her throat, and caught my eye. 

“Bathroom?” she murmured, raising one hand slightly, as if I were a teacher from whom she needed permission. I leapt up.

“Oh!” I exclaimed. “Um, down the hall, on the right.” 

Davies stood and gave me a final nervous look before hurrying down the hall. 

I sat back down and waited. She was back in three minutes, smelling of clean hands and spring soap. She returned to the divan, pulled a small pillow into her lap, and stared at me while picking nervously at her fingernails. I hoped she wasn’t about to start crying. 

“I’m April,” she said. She stared at me and waited. I frowned and glared back. “What should I call you?” she asked, avoiding my eyes. 

“God sent you to me, didn’t he?” I asked. She was blatantly surprised by the question before she restrained her emotions again. Her fingers went up and covered her cross, and she blinked at me. 

“I don’t know if God sent me to you. Maybe He sent you to me? I’m not privy to His plans, I’m afraid.” 

“If God didn’t send you, then why are you here?”

“Because you brought me here.”

I shook my head. 

“No. We did not meet by accident. This must be God’s plan. You were sent to me for a reason, and that reason is clear. I’ve done something wrong. Again. He always sends a new messenger when I’ve done something wrong.” 

Davies took this in with a fair amount of sangfroid. I was more and more impressed with her calmness, and more embarrassed by my own nervousness. I must have seemed like a complete idiot. 

“Do you want to talk? I’m a good listener,” she said. 

“What have I done wrong?” I asked. “You were sent to stop me, because I’ve done something wrong. Tell me what I’ve done wrong.” 

“Tell me your name. Start there.” 

“Ed. Eddie. I don’t care,” I whispered. I couldn’t help the tremor in my voice. Her eyes followed me closely. 

“Perhaps you’d be more comfortable if I were to call you ‘sir’, and you called me ‘ma’am’?” she asked. 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

She gave a faint smile, then lowered her eyes. “I’m sorry. I’m not making fun of you. I’m nervous. Maybe you’ve been through this, but I haven’t.”

“I’ve never kidnapped anyone before,” I promised. I had gone into her apartment with the intent of killing her, and yet now, now, I could not fathom why I had even considered doing that. I couldn’t kill her, and I couldn’t leave her, so there had been no choice but to bring her. But now what? Now what?! 

“Petru got held up at the restaurant once,” she rambled. 

“Petru. Peter. Your boyfriend?” 

“Yes.”

“What happened?” 

“A drug addict broke in, and held him at gunpoint, and made him open the register. There wasn’t any money. The restaurant wasn’t open yet. Petru was there by himself doing food prep. He’s always there early afternoon ahead of everyone else.”

“What happened?” 

“Petru gave the guy all the money he had in his wallet, and his Saint Basil necklace, and the guy took off.”

“Maybe God was watching over Petru?”

“Either God or Saint Basil,” Davies nodded. 

“I won’t hurt you,” I promised. 

“Thank you. I appreciate that. I won’t make any sudden moves if you don’t. Deal?” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

“Start at the beginning, and tell me what you’ve done,” she said. 

I watched her eyes, and saw the empathy in her young face. I fumbled for words. 

“Dr. Ramirez is my friend. He understands me. He promised he would help me. But he didn’t show up. I was scared. I didn’t know what to do.” 

“Dr. Ramirez?” she questioned. She covered her mouth with her fingertips, bit back words. A flash of anger went through her eyes, but she pushed that away too. “This was his idea? Kidnapping me? But why? What did I ever do to him?” 

“He never said to kidnap you. He said we should meet so we could talk, he and I, and I agreed to meet him. He told me, that’s all, how they were working against him, how they would go behind his back and steal his work, steal his ideas, steal his….” 

“They who? You mean, at work? No one wanted to steal Dr. Ramirez’s work or his ideas. Did it ever occur to you that Dr. Ramirez might be a tad paranoid? Maybe even crazy? No one was working against him. He had no reason to hurt Bernie,” Davies said, her voice shaking, her eyes tearing up. “She gave him months on his case, in spite of the fact it was going nowhere. In spite of the fact that it was clear….” 

“What was clear?” I wondered. She lowered her head and shook it slowly. She was disappointed, either in me or someone else. 

“You are the one sending him those messages from the books,” she whispered. 

“We were supposed to meet and talk, but he never showed up. I knew something must have happened to him,” I replied. 

“Dr. Ramirez didn’t show up wherever you were going to meet him, because he shot Bernie Rabovsky yesterday, shot her twice, right in the chest. He probably killed her. He shot her for no reason except his own fear of failure. He blamed her for his own failings. He blamed everyone but himself for what he could not do,” Davies growled. “So you waited for him, and he didn’t show, and then…..then you went for Plan B?” 

“It had to be done.” 

“Did you tell him to shoot Bernie? Why would you do a thing like that?! She never did anything to him but try and help him. She’s a nice person! She has a daughter! She wasn’t anyone’s enemy. She went out of her way to be kind to Dr. Ramirez.”

“It had to be done.” 

“What had to be done? Why did it have to be done?” 

“They hurt Dr. Ramirez. So I hurt them.” 

“No one hurt him at all,” she replied, her anger rising. “His misery was of his own design. What do you mean, you hurt them? What have you done?” she demanded more sharply. I knew she was recalling all the addresses and personal information she had seen in the SUV.

“They wanted his job. They wanted his soul. They had to be stopped,” I said simply. 

“No one wanted his job. They have their own jobs. What do you mean, they had to be stopped?” she whispered. Fear was creeping into her eyes once more. 

“I did what had to be done,” I said simply. “Dr. Ramirez is my friend, and he needed my help, and I did what I had to do when it was clear that they had taken him down.” 

“What did you do?” she asked again. 

“My job.” 

“What’s your job?” she asked.

“Dr. Ramirez is my friend.” 

Davies stopped talking to me. She sat back on the divan and stared around the living room and the kitchen area, at anything but me. She bowed her head, and buried her face in her hands. 

“I did what had to be done,” I said. “I did what God said to do.” 

She lashed out. I was not prepared. The slap took me hard across the face, knocked me flat to the ground before her. 

“God would never ask you to hurt innocent people! If Dr. Ramirez asked you to hurt them, then he was not your friend, and he was certainly not a messenger from God!” she hollered. 

I held my cheek and blinked up at her, taking in the fury and the horror in her face. I sat on the floor and let my repentant tears fall. She drew herself up, and then sat down again with a frightful sob. 

“I’m sorry,” she pined. 

“No. I’ve done wrong. I deserve your anger. Punish me.” 

“I shouldn’t have hit you.”

“I deserve it.”

“No,” she said. “I’m sorry. I promise you, I’ll help you. I’ll get help for you. I’ll do whatever it takes. Why are you sure I’m a messenger? What is God’s plan for you?” 

“I don’t know,” I admitted. 

“I guess we’ll be winging this then,” she whispered, rubbing the cross at her neck and looking forlorn. “Do you have ice? Let me get some ice for you.” 

I sat on the floor in stunned silence, holding my face, as she walked towards the fridge, opened the freezer door, and pulled out a handful of ice cubes. She came back to the living room area, sank down onto the divan, and gave me the cubes one by one. 

“I’m sorry,” she said again, and I truly believed her.


	5. Dragon and Rat

5.5 – Dragon and Rat (Nov 22 – 9 a.m.)

 

I slept on the floor in front of the sofa. Davies slept on the sofa. I could feel her eyes on me in the night. She sat up once, stepped carefully over me. I felt for my gun in case I needed it. She wasn’t headed for the door. She stepped slowly down the hallway. I heard the toilet flush, heard her wash her hands. She returned, smelling of clean soap. She sat on the sofa, sighed softly, and laid back down. She was asleep again quickly. 

The morning was a beautiful one – pre-dawn light filled the small living room and treaded into my dreams. Davies was standing in front of the living room windows, watching the birds in the tree outside, watching people walk back and forth on the sidewalk, watching cars go by on the road in the distance. I sat up, and she turned around. 

“It’s clear you weren’t planning to kidnap or hold anyone. There isn’t a thing to eat in your kitchen. I don’t want to venture a guess as to why you have plastic explosives and gunpowder stacked in the cabinet by the range, and I’m not criticizing, but I would recommend a more appropriate storage space, away from the stove and the open flames.” 

“Are you hungry?” I asked her. She came back to the divan and sat down. 

“You need to go get some food. I’ll wait here. Do you have any handcuffs?” 

“Why would I have handcuffs?” 

“I don’t want you to worry that I’m going to escape while you’re out getting food, and I doubt you want to drag a woman in a bathrobe around with you to the grocery store. I really want you to go get food. I’m starved. You must be hungry too. I’ll wait here. You have my word. But I suspect it would make you feel better if you were assured that I was going to be here when you got back. Handcuffs? Rope?”

“You could have left while I was asleep.” 

“I was thinking about what you said,” she murmured. 

“Which part?” I wondered. 

“God’s plan.”

“You didn’t leave because God told you to stay?” I asked. 

“I didn’t leave because I want to help you. Maybe that is God’s plan. Maybe it’s my own decision. Maybe our paths have crossed because God wants me to help you. Or maybe I feel like you need help.” 

“Why aren’t you afraid of me?” 

“I don’t know.”

“God is protecting you, that’s why. God doesn’t want me to hurt you, and I won’t.”

“He must have a reason for doing this to both of us.”

“Yes!” 

“So if you have rope…?”

I shook my head no. 

“A tie or two?” she suggested. 

“I don’t like ties.” 

“You need to plan ahead the next time you kidnap someone. Where’s your bedroom?” she asked, standing up and walking towards the hallway. 

“First on the left,” I called out, getting to my feet to follow her as she vanished into my room. The other two doors besides the bathroom were closed, and I was glad to note that she had not opened either on. I found her leafing through the clothes hanging in my closet. She cast a glance at me, and pulled out a pair of jeans. 

“Could you… you know… turn around?” she asked. 

I spun away, and leaned on the doorframe. I could tell she was pulling on my clothes. I was embarrassed I hadn’t thought about this sooner. She prowled through more clothes. Selected a blue sweatshirt. Pulled it on. She stared at the hangers before putting them back on the rod. 

“Maybe you could tie me up with a sweatshirt or something? Do you have any experience tying people up?” 

“Not exactly,” I hedged. She closed the closet door. 

“You can turn around now,” she said. “Books. You have a lot of books,” she commented, staring at the brimming bookcases by the bedroom door. 

“Yes,” I nodded. 

“Do you like to read?” 

“Very much.” 

“May I borrow one or two?”

“Yes,” I replied. She tilted her head sideways and read a few titles. 

"Cold Mountain?" she commented. "You should read his other one too." 

"Other?" 

"Thirteen Moons," she murmured. "He's amazing." 

“You should come with me to get food. I don’t know what you like. What if I get the wrong thing? What if you’re allergic? What if you don’t like what I choose?” I rambled. 

“This is Thanksgiving,” she gasped suddenly. “That explains the lack of traffic outside. Nothing is open on Thanksgiving except maybe 7-11.”

“I’m sorry.” 

“Hey, no. I’m not complaining. 7-11 is great. Lots of food there,” she replied cheerfully. “Spicy bites. Chips. M&M’s. Don’t tell Petru. He doesn’t approve of junk food.” 

“We could get Chinese,” I offered. “Unless you’re allergic,” I retracted when she gave me a curious look. 

“Chinese is good too, if you’ve got a favorite place,” she said warily. 

“It’s a couple blocks away. Close enough to walk,” I answered. We both stared down at her bare feet. She had square feet with short toes, and tiny pink toenails. A pang of remembrance washed through my brain – Lisa had had toes like that. “I have extra boots,” I offered humbly.

* * *

“Dragon,” Davies announced in a soft voice, staring down at the placemat on the table in front of her.

“What?” I blinked. 

“1988. I’m a dragon. That’s very auspicious,” she decided. “What about you?” 

I stared down at my placemat and searched through the numbers. “Rat,” I said cautiously. 

“I wonder if we’re compatible,” she whispered. I heard a thump below the table. One of the my old army boots had slipped off her foot again. She moved her leg sideways and shoved her foot back inside again. “Will your family be worried if you don’t call them today?” Davies asked. I shook my head no. 

“What about your family?” I asked her. 

“My mom will be very upset with me,” she lamented. 

“You could call her, if you want,” I offered. She stared at me, unsure for a moment if she could trust that offer, before shaking her head. 

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she refused. 

“Why not?” I questioned. 

“What am I supposed to say? I can’t tell her the truth. I’ll start crying. I’ll make my mom cry. I don’t want to make my mom cry.”

“Tell her God has a plan for you, and we are trying to figure it out. When we understand God’s plan, I’ll let you go home.” 

She touched the cross at her neck and picked up the chopsticks on the side of her placemat. 

“Thank you for lunch, Ed,” she said simply.

“You’re welcome, April,” I replied as the waiter hurried over with heaping plates of noodles and vegetables, and steamed dumplings. 

We ate in silence, chewing, staring around the empty restaurant at everything but each other. The waiter was standing at the counter watching us with shrewd eyes. 

“We should hurry,” Davies murmured between bites. “He doesn’t like the looks of us. He wants to know why we’re eating Chinese at 10 a.m. on Thanksgiving. Maybe he thinks we’re going to bolt without paying?” 

“I’ll go cover the bill,” I said, putting down my chopsticks and standing up from the table. It didn’t take five minutes for me to pay the check and return. Davies was poking around her noodles, picking out carrot pieces, stray peas, before scooping up another dumpling. 

“Should we take the rest to go?” she asked. 

I nodded in agreement and turned to call out to the waiter. He was at the table in an instant, helping box the remainder of the food. We picked up the two fortune cookies on the table. Our exit was heralded by the bells above the door. 

In our efforts to be as inconspicuous as possible while strolling along the sidewalk, we only stood out more. What few people were out all turned to stare at us. I carried the bag of food, and Davies walked a step behind me. 

She stopped altogether on the corner, staring at the newspaper in the stand outside the convenience store. There were pictures on the front page, three car bombings, and one missing agent. Her official picture was small, but clearly recognizable. It must have been the same one on her FBI badge. She caught her breath and gave me a stern glance. I took hold of her arm, and she followed me back to the house.


	6. Make Amends

6.5 – Make Amends (Nov 22 – 5 p.m.)

 

When we got back to the house, Davies went to my bedroom, sat down on the floor, and started to cry. I wasn’t surprised. She had been holding in her emotions the entire way home. I sat in the hallway and waited, listening to her tears, listening to the hiccups and gasps, wondering what I should do. 

I thought about offering comfort, but decided that might only get me another slap in the face. I thought about Lisa again – thought about how her cries had filled the house. Some nights the wind reminded me of her cries too. Instead of offering comfort, I put the leftover Chinese in the fridge, and sat at the kitchen table, watching shadows play around the living room and kitchen as the day passed slowly into evening. I tried to find comfort in a book – Fahrenheit 451 – Ray Bradbury. One of my favorites, to be sure. Lisa haunted me from the shadows, and intruded upon my reading with memories of her tears, her cries of pain. I put away my book, and I prayed. I prayed hard. I prayed for Lisa as I had not done in years, prayed for her to leave me be, prayed for forgiveness for what I had done to her, for how I had let her down. Once it had been her and me. Then it was only me. 

I hated being back in this house. I hated the history here. I hated the shadows. As much as the memories of Lisa had been here to greet me, my father’s ghost tread these floors as well. I hated the smell of this place – his rancid beer and his cheap aftershave permeated the walls and the curtains and the carpets and the very soul of the house. I couldn’t wait to be gone from here again. Soon. Soon. 

There was no sign of movement from the bedroom, and so I crept down the hallway to peek in on Davies. April was asleep on the floor in front of the bookcases. I took off my jacket, laid it over her shoulders, and quietly left the room. Lisa was in the shadows again, following me, crying my name.

I picked up my keys and left. I stood at the front door of the house and could not decide which way I should go. I walked to the convenience store again, and bought a newspaper out of the metal box in front of the store. I noticed the clerk watching me. When I waved at him, he waved back, and everything seemed friendly enough. He remembered me from over the summer when I had come back for my father's funeral, and he knew I had been around for at least a couple weeks this time too, so he didn't find my presence disturbing or out of the ordinary. I went into the store, and purchased a couple sodas, some M&M’s, and random paperback or two. 

I walked slowly back to the house, wondering what I might find. Should I wait longer to return? Would Davies be there or not? I couldn’t decide which prospect scared me more—that she might have escaped, or that she wouldn’t even have tried. I climbed the stairs and unlocked the door, carrying the newspaper and books and food inside. 

April Davies was sitting at the small table in the kitchen, leaning her cheek on her hand on one elbow on the surface of the table. Her eyes were puffy, and her plain face was morose. She had been reading Ray Bradbury in my absence. 

I put down the bag, and pulled out the M&M’s, and slid them carefully across the table at her. She accepted the bag. She opened the candies and carefully divided them by colors, and then pushed half of them towards me. I nibbled. She nibbled. 

I pushed the newspaper and paperbacks at her. She spread the newspaper out on the table to read the article about the bombings, and about her own disappearance. Ever so often, she would raise her eyes at me, and I would feel the shame burning on my face. 

“I’m sorry,” I said simply. 

“You should be,” she answered back, drying her wet eyes. 

All my crimes were laid out for her to see. Davies was angry at me, very angry, but holding it all inside instead of shouting at me, or slapping me, or lashing out. Somehow it was worse that she was disappointed instead of angry. 

“Are they all dead?” I asked unhappily. I knew what I had done wrong now. I knew what I had done. I had lashed out in anger, and nothing good ever comes of anger. Good only comes from careful planning. 

“Dr. Larsson is dead, yes. Rockford, no, but he’s in grave condition. Bernie is in guarded condition,” Davies replied, her voice trembling. 

“I never did anything to Bernie.”

“Fine,” she whispered. "Poor Dr. Larsson. She was always so nice to me. I can't believe...." 

“What about Dr. Reid?”

“If you hurt Jack, I will never speak to you again,” Davies ground out the words, her eyes welling up. 

“Jack?” I asked, remembering the blond boy on the porch. 

“Dr. Reid’s son. He has a daughter too. Jack is Agent Hotchner’s biological son, and Mouse is Dr. Reid’s biological daughter. She’s eleven or twelve, I can’t remember, and she lives in Seattle with her mother.” 

I processed this info with a shudder. I knew what it was like to grow up without one parent. It was a half-life I wouldn't wish on anyone -- the wishing and the longing. There is no more painful dream than what might have been. 

“Hotchner?" I questioned. "That’s the tubby man with gray hair?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to be in a relationship with him, but to each their own. Davies wasn’t attractive either, but she had a boyfriend.

“No. Agent Hotchner is tall and fit. Dark hair. Dark eyes. Fifty-ish. Don’t let the good looks fool you. He’s got this stare that can peel paint and curdle milk.” 

“I didn’t hurt the boy. I wouldn’t do that,” I promised. 

“You better hope Jack isn’t hurt, because Agent Hotchner would hunt you to the ends of the Earth if you hurt his son, let alone how angry he will be at you for hurting Dr. Reid. He won’t stop until he finds you.”

“I don’t hurt children,” I insisted, not comfortable with the idea of the dark-eyed Agent Hotchner following me around. Memories flashed before my eyes - the bombing in Najaf. The primary target of the first IED had been a British convoy, taking relief supplies to families in need. The primary device had been detonated while they were handing out food, and most of those who were killed were mothers with young children. If I hadn't been so shaken up by the sight of their broken and bleeding bodies, I would have suspected there might be another device. If I hadn't stopped to help the girl with the injured leg, if I hadn't put down my equipment, and bent to pick her up, to bring her to safety, I would have seen the second device before it went off. 'It's not your job to render aid, Trovinger!' my captain's words echoed in my head. I saw the little girl's face in my dreams still - black hair and dark brown eyes rimmed in redness, her pleading words, her small hands reaching for me. I remember the blood - all the blood - her tangled limbs, and her shredded clothes. 

“What about Dr. Rockford’s son? You hurt him. He’s dead," Davies pointed out sourly. 

“I’m sorry about that, very sorry,” I repeated. I was - I could see his face too.

“The article says Dr. Reid is in a coma. It doesn’t mention another man.”

“Reid pulled someone out of his car.”

“What?”

“Dr. Reid could have run away, but he ran towards the car, and pulled out the man who was there.” 

“What did the man look like?” 

“Middle aged, gray hair, and tubby,” I replied. She knew who I meant, but did not give a name. "I was surprised by what he did. The doctor. I was so surprised." 

“There’s no mention of anyone else in the article, except…..” 

Davies paused, lifted her face, stared plaintively at me. 

“What?” I asked. 

“Dr. Ramirez is dead. Did you blow him up too?” she sniveled. “I thought you said he was your friend.”

“No, I….I didn’t touch Dr. Ramirez,” I whimpered. “What do you mean he’s dead?” Davies kept reading. 

“He was taken into custody after he shot Bernie Rabovsky. The article says that Dr. Ramirez hanged himself in his jail cell. I’m sorry. That wasn't you. You didn’t know?”

“It’s my fault,” I decided, hanging my head, mourning my friend. “I failed him.” 

“You didn’t fail him. He failed himself. You didn’t tell him to shoot Bernie, did you?” 

“No.” 

“Then you are not to blame for what Dr. Ramirez did, either to Bernie, or to himself. You are only responsible for what you’ve done.”

“That’s enough though, isn’t it?” I whispered. 

“Ed, it’s not too late to turn yourself around,” Davies replied. I sniffed, snorted, and looked up at her. 

“I’ve gone too far,” I trembled. "I acted out of anger. I should never act out of anger." 

“Maybe God brought me to you, or you to me, because He wants you to stop doing what you’re doing. He wants you to stop hurting people.” 

“How am I supposed to make this right? I killed those people. I killed them. I can’t undo that. I can’t fix that!” I shouted, raising my voice, making her shake with fear. 

“You can’t change anything for the people you’ve already killed, but you can undo other things.” 

“I should let you go. I should take you home. I shouldn’t have taken you in the first place. The longer I keep you, the angrier they will be. I’ll take you back home, and you will tell them that I didn’t hurt you. I wouldn’t hurt you. I promise I won’t hurt you, Lisa.”

“Ed, if you release me, then what will you do?” she asked. 

“I’ll do what I should have done years ago. I’ll kill myself so I can’t hurt anyone else,” I said. 

“Ed. No. Listen to me. Suicide is not the answer. You believe in God, don’t you?” 

“Yes.” 

“God does not want you to commit suicide.” 

“You said you don’t know what God’s plan is,” I sniffed. “How am I supposed to figure out what He wants from me?” 

“My grandmother always used to say that the answer is in our hearts. The question is if you can listen to your heart. I think God wants you to stop hurting people. He wants you to make amends for what you’ve done.” 

“How? How do I make amends? How do I repent these sins? ‘My words fly up, my thought remain below’.” 

“The first step is to do no more harm,” she insisted firmly. 

“What’s the second step?” I pleaded. 

Davies combed over the article with her eyes, and lighted on a particular passage. 

“William Price.” 

“Sergeant Price. What about him?” 

“You took his car?”

“Yes.” How did she know about that?! Had God told her?

“You should give him back his car.”

“What is that going to fix?” 

“It would be a gesture of good faith, at the very least.” 

“I can’t drive the car back to his house and leave it there. I’m sure the police and the FBI have his home under surveillance. They’ll shoot me the minute they see me. I might as well kill myself.” 

“No. Stop talking like that. You can’t kill yourself.”

“What do I do? I want to make this right again.”

“First, you swear that you will do no more harm, and secondly, you make amends for what you’ve already done,” Davies said. She folded the paper up, and put it in the middle of the table. “We are going to return Sergeant Price’s car.”


	7. Lost and Found

7.5 – Lost and Found (Nov 22 – 8:00 p.m.)

 

It took hours to clean out Sergeant Price’s SUV, and true to her word, Davies helped me every step of the way, from vacuuming the seats and floorboards, and the ceiling, to washing the interior of the vehicle, to carefully stacking up the Prices’ personal possessions near the side of the carwash. I felt bad, going through all this trouble. It would have been easier to detonate a device under the vehicle and destroy all evidence which might have remained. There was something cleansing about fire, the way it washed away all sins. But April said we should return the Sergeant’s car, so we would. 

I left the Prices’ vehicle parked at the carwash, and walked Davies back to my house. I unlocked the door and guided her inside. She placed their things on the table: the maps and papers, dog toys, and a child’s cup. The earrings too. Davies had admired them, and sighed about what a romantic gift they were. I wondered if Petru ever gave her romantic gifts. 

“I’ll be back,” I promised. 

“I’ll be here,” she replied. 

Here I was, back an hour later, creeping up the porch steps and into the house. I stepped in the door to find Davies was sitting on the sofa, nose deep in Ray Bradbury again. 

“You did not drive all the way to Williamsburg and back in fifty-eight minutes,” she decided as she noted the page number and closed the book. She got up and stepped closer, sniffing at me carefully, like a bloodhound might have done. “You didn’t do anything…. incendiary, did you?” she worried. 

“No,” I shook my head quickly. “I left the vehicle at the grocery store two miles away and walked back here. Surely someone will notice it, call the police, and return the car to the Sergeant?”

“The FBI would have distributed an APB concerning the vehicle to all local police departments,” she replied, nodding. “Leaving the SUV at grocery store was a great idea. It sees an ample amount of traffic during the day. An abandoned car will get noticed very quickly. Ed, while you were gone, I looked around for your laptop. You must have a computer. You had all those print-outs with our addresses and information. I need to borrow your computer.”

“Why do you need my computer?” I asked warily. “You didn’t go in the basement, did you?” 

“No. Why?” she wondered. 

“Don’t go in the basement,” I warned. Her eyes got wide. “Don’t go down there. Don’t.”

“Okay. I won’t go in the basement,” she promised. 

“Why do you need my computer?” I asked again. 

“I wanted to read the news. You don’t have a tv." 

"My dad broke the tv." 

"I want to know how Dr. Reid is doing,” she pleaded. “He’s my friend. The same way Dr. Ramirez was your friend.” 

“I apologized for hurting Dr. Reid. Isn’t that enough?” I mumbled. 

“I believe you are sorry,” she nodded. “But I want to know how he is.” 

“What do we do with all of this?” I asked, motioning to the Prices’ things in the middle of the table. 

“I washed the cup and the clover, and wiped off the GPS to take away fingerprints. We have their address. We should mail all of this back to the Prices.”

“If we were going to give it back, why not leave it in the car?” I asked. 

“Too much temptation for a would-be thief. I track neighborhood crime – it’s a big concern for me. I’m a woman living alone. DC isn’t safe. Arlington is bad enough, and Fairfax is getting worse every day. Do you know how often cars with GPS devices get broken into, things get stolen out of them? It made more sense to take the Prices’ things out of the car. We can mail everything back to them if you have a box and tape,” Davies insisted. 

I had to agree. There was too much crime around here. I hadn’t been back in such a long time, and I wouldn’t have returned if not for my father’s death and the fact the house was now mine to deal with. His insurance policy had been a unpleasant surprise. I felt guilty because I didn't love him, and I didn't want his money. I had come back out of a sense of family duty, and had only stayed as long as necessary over the summer. Since I had first left home, the face of the neighborhood had changed. Although the houses were still those small brick mausoleums constructed during the 50’s and 60’s, the property values had sky-rocketed because Fairfax had become one of the outlying bedroom communities for the DC commuters. As the city had expanded in all directions, there had been a steady rise in personal and property crime, which was blamed on the Latin-American and Mexican immigrants who came here for construction work in the outlying suburbs. But truth be known, there had been plenty of crime going on around Virginia long before anyone from El Salvador or Mexico City had ever arrived. I knew from personal experience. 

“I shouldn’t have taken the Sergeant’s car in the first place. I should have thought ahead. I mean, what’s he been doing to get back and forth to work? Or his wife?” I chided myself. 

“Maybe they rented a car?” she said. “Insurance will often cover rental cars in the event of accident or theft.”

“If not, that’s expensive,” I winced. 

“You could pay them back for their troubles,” she suggested. I seized on the idea. 

“Yes! Repay them! That’s a great idea!” I agreed. That would be an excellent way to be rid of some of the money from my father's insurance. I didn't want it, so giving it to someone else made perfect sense to me. 

I bounced on my feet and headed towards my bedroom. She followed. I pulled open the dresser and heard her gasp. I gazed down into my sock drawer, and decided maybe it was a surprise to see that much money in one place at one time. Or perhaps it wasn’t the money that had surprised her. 

“Did you build those?” she whispered, keeping a safe distance. I glanced over at the detonation devices which were tucked in with the rolled-up socks. “You learned to build them in the military? Were you in the Army?”

“I never wanted to go into the Army in the first place. But my father said I had to go. You’re eighteen. You’re on your own. Those were the house rules. I sure as hell didn't want to stay here with him. So I enlisted.”

“You learned to build bombs?”

“I learned to build them and defuse them,” I revealed. “I got pretty good at it.” 

“I’m glad you’re keeping those separate from the stuff in the kitchen,” she stammered. “Don’t want anything going off accidentally.” 

“Keep what….?” I questioned. 

“It’s good to keep the explosives away from the timers. Those are timers? Right?” 

“Yes,” I said, picking up a few bundles of money from the other side of the drawer. It was pretty clear that Davies didn’t know much about bombs, and I was all right with that notion. The less she knew about it, the better for her. “How much does it cost to rent a car for a week? A family car? A big SUV like the Sergeant has?”

“I rented a car in Colorado once. I went there for a seminar for work. It cost around $200 for a mid-size sedan for four days. That included gas though,” she replied. 

"Colorado. It's beautiful there." 

"Yes, it was nice. The mountains were peaceful," she agreed. 

"I liked Colorado," I said. She nodded, and continued on about the rental car. “I had to fill the tank before I returned the car. But that doesn’t take into consideration that those were Midwestern prices, which tend to be lower on average that prices on either coast," she said. 

I closed the sock drawer and stood up, giving her the bundles of money. 

“This should cover the cost of renting a car, and any inconvenience,” I said. 

“More than sufficient,” she whispered, smiling proudly at my generosity. “Do you have a box?”

“No.” 

“Is there a post office nearby? We can buy one there.”

“Five blocks away,” I replied. “It wouldn’t be open today though.” 

“First thing in the morning, we’ll go to the post office and get what we need to ship things. In the meantime, please, I would like to check up on Dr. Reid, and see how he is doing.”

“You could call the hospital,” I suggested. Davies paused, then shook her head no. 

“I’m not family. The hospital won’t release any private information to someone not a family member. I just want to know he's going to be all right.”


	8. Love Versus Admiration

8.5 – Love versus Admiration (Nov 23 – 2:00 a.m.)

 

We sat on the bed in my bedroom for several hours, as I searched every article I could find on her friend Dr. Reid. In the midst of this search on his present condition, other articles kept surfacing. Dr. Reid had written numerous works for scientific and criminal justice periodicals. Articles written about him also appeared in our searches. Although nothing more could be discerned about his current condition other that he was in a coma in grave condition, it seemed to comfort Davies to read all the other postings about him. 

“You’ve known him a long time? Worked with him a long time?” I asked. 

“Only a few months,” she replied as she scanned the latest article, a submission he had written for a physics periodical. “He’s a legend in the Bureau though.”

“Oh. One of those guys….” I rolled my eyes. “All ego.” 

“No. He’s not all ego. He’s very modest and self-depreciative. He’s a legend because of his work. He was the youngest FBI agent ever, and the youngest agent to join the Behavioral Sciences Unit.” 

“You’re awfully attached to someone you’ve known but a short time,” I commented. She gave me a sour, sideways glance. 

“You sound like Hilda. Our receptionist. She keeps accusing me of being in love with Dr. Reid. There’s no room for platonic affection in her world.” 

“Are you in love with him?” I wondered how it might feel to be the object of her affection. Hell, of anyone's affection. It was an alien concept to me - I had never been that close to anyone, not close enough that I would need to share my world with them. There had been friends, a lover or two, but I did not let anyone inside my walls. Even the messengers that God would send to me, I knew enough to keep them at a safe distance. Some had had no idea what kind of influence they had had on me. Like Sergeant Price. At first he had reminded me of my father, and I had been ill at ease with him, but once he had opened up about how much he longed to be a father, how having children was going to make him be the best person he could ever be, the best father a child could ever have, I saw him in a different light altogether. Other members of our unit had complained about their girlfriends and spouses, bitched about their children in the same breath as missing them, but Sergeant Price had built up this future fantasy in his mind about what it was going to be like to be a father. He even had names chosen - Olive and Christopher. The moment I had seen that precious little girl sitting in her car seat, my heart had brightened with joy for Sergeant Price. He had his Olive at last. I knew how much she meant to her parents. I wondered if Davies longed for a family too. 

“No, I am not in love with Dr. Reid,” she said at once. “But you see, no matter how often I say that, no one believes me. I tell them, I admire Dr. Reid. He’s one of the best minds of this generation. I admire him, and covet his ability to learn, because it’s absolutely limitless.”

“Limitless?” I jolted. 

“He's a genius. He remembers everything he reads, most of what he hears. He absorbs knowledge. A lot of people hate him because they think he’s a threat, or that he’s strange, or that he’s just plain creepy. He freaks people out because he remembers so much about them. But he doesn’t memorize your address or your bank account numbers. He remembers things like how much sugar do you like in your coffee, or the color of your favorite shirt so he can buy you earrings to match. He’s memorized every tie that his partner has, and so when he goes shopping for him, he is always sure he’s going to find a tie that Agent Hotchner will like and doesn’t already own.”

“You do sound smitten,” I commented, almost smiling. 

“No. I love Petru. I admire Dr. Reid.”

“How does Petru feel about Dr. Reid?” 

Davies frowned, and that said I needed to know. Her boyfriend did not approve of her admiration of her colleague. 

“What was Dr. Ramirez like in person?” I asked. She continued to frown. 

“I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead. It’s not appropriate.” 

“Tell me the truth. Was I listening to a false messenger?” 

“He was an uptight, paranoid, attention-seeking drama queen. Having said that, everyone has a little good in them somewhere. He wasn’t a bad man. He was afraid, I think, of lots of things. Afraid he wasn’t good enough. Afraid someone might show him up. Afraid of being a failure. I can relate to those fears. I have them too. But you can’t blame anyone around you for your own decisions, your own weaknesses.”

“Maybe he never felt he was good enough because his parents made him feel unworthy,” I supposed. It hurt to hear her say such things about Dr. Ramirez, because he had been so very kind to me, but there had been false messengers in my life before. I should have seen the signs. I should have known. Somehow God always knew when I needed a new messenger, because he would always send me another one when I was needy. 

“From what I’ve read, that’s the primary source of most people’s personal problems – how their parents treat them,” Davies whispered sadly, clicking keys and turning to another article. This one was on the effects that being in a coma has on the brain. 

“Dr. Reid might be completely different afterwards, you know? Sometimes, people come out of comas, and their personalities have been altered,” I said, glad to change the course of the conversation before she asked anything personal about my own parents. I found it refreshing that Davies seemed equally as reluctant to discuss her own family though. Why hadn’t she wanted to call her mother? I found that curious. Very curious. I had assumed that they were close. Why hadn’t she jumped at the chance to call her mother and reassure her? If she didn’t want to call her mother, she could have called her father, but she didn’t want to talk to either of them. I was intrigued. 

April frowned and nodded. I don’t think she trusted herself to speak. Maybe I shouldn’t have said that at all. Her expression made me want to erase what I had said, fix what I had done. 

“I could go to the hospital and find out how he is,” I offered. 

“Ed, we can’t walk into ICU and check on a patient that way.” 

“After we return the Sergeant’s papers and maps, we’ll go to the hospital and check on Dr. Reid,” I promised. “I’ll get us in.” 

“We’ll see,” she squinted skeptically. 

“I will make amends one way or the other. I promise I will.”

“Tomorrow then,” she relented. She handed me back the computer, and stood up from the bed. 

“No. You sleep here. I’ll sleep on the sofa,” I said, putting the computer under the bed.

“I could sleep in one of the other bedrooms,” she said, pointing into the hallway. 

“No. You can’t sleep in Lisa’s room. She wouldn’t like that at all. You can’t sleep in my father’s room either,” I said, leaving the room before she could protest.


	9. Agent Davies

9.5 – Agent Davies (Nov 23 – 9:00 a.m.)

 

“Don’t take this question the wrong way, but who does this car belong to?” I asked, glancing sideways at Ed. He nervously glanced back at me. He had called a cab at the crack of dawn, and had returned to the house with this car. 

“Hondas are reliable, dependable cars with tremendous resale value,” he replied. He had answered my question indirectly. The small, cluttered jalopy must be his own vehicle, which I should have guessed from the evidence. There were books piled everywhere, in the backseat, in the floorboards front and back. I suspected there were even books in the trunk, because I could hear shifting back there. Hopefully it was books - boxes of books? - because I did realize that there could be much more unsavory objects stored back there. The books in the backseat were neatly stacked, and great care had been taken to fit as many as possible into the vehicle without impeding the visual sight lines. 

“You might consider buying a Kindle,” I mused. 

“I have one somewhere around the house. I don’t remember where I left it though. Lisa might have borrowed it.”

I stared at him, and wondered again who Lisa was. From the second I had encountered him in my kitchen, with that dumb-founded look on his face, Ed had reminded me of a cousin I had met once at a family reunion in the Poconos. Leonard wasn't slow, but he was easily-led and impressionable. He had been logical, but in a child-like way. Dad had said it was because his cousin, Len's mom, had smoked too much marijuana in college when she was pregnant with her son. I don't know if that was true, or if it had more to do with the fact that every five minutes, Len's mom or his dad or his sister was screaming at him to stop being so goddamn stupid. That kind of repetitive, abusive indoctrination has a way of sinking into someone's soul, like a heavy rock to the bottom of a shallow pool. I spent that entire family reunion being as kind to Len as possible, because I felt sorry for him, and he was sweet and soulful and so sad. Len followed me like a lost dog the whole day. He wrote to me for years, and I wrote back, until he joined the army and got himself killed in Iraq. I had Len's dog-tags somewhere safe at home. I wished I had them with me now. Ed reminded me a lot of Len, and I wasn't surprised to learn he too had wound up in the military. 

“There’s not a lot of leg room in here. Sorry about the question. I wondered if you stole this car on the spur of the moment, or out of necessity,” I added. 

“I didn’t steal it. I bought it. I’ve had it since high school.” 

He wasn’t being defensive. I think he might have been a little amused. It was hard to tell. His eyebrows went up and down, and his eyes came sideways again. He was concerned about my opinion of him. 

“I had to save for years for this car. You don’t even drive,” he added, as if to say my opinion on his vehicle was irrelevant. 

“After driving this, I can see where an SUV would have been tempting,” I offered. It was time for me to shut up. I didn't want to press my luck. We seemed to have reached a tentative understanding. I wasn’t going to run, and he wasn’t going to shoot me. I didn’t want to say anything that was going to change that agreement. 

“That SUV got terrible gas mileage,” Ed frowned. I was trying to decipher his age – as near as I could guess, he was in his mid thirties. This Accord was a late 90’s model – after the flip-up headlights had been replaced by a broader front which had incorporated the lamps and casings into the grill. Late 90’s. Maybe he was closer to 40? But then again, it might have been used when he purchased it. Between 30 and 35? 

Ed was an army veteran with a troubled past – that much I did know for certain. I couldn’t help the way my training was kicking in – learn as much as you can about the person you are dealing with, do your best to keep in their good graces, and do everything you can not to annoy them. I felt guilty for probing him and putting away mental notes on him, but I knew my life depended on it, as much as it depended on the copious fingerprints I was leaving all over his house, in the kitchen, the bedroom, the bathroom especially. I wanted my colleagues to know I had been there, should the question of where I was or where I had been should become a mystery. 

We were on Lee Highway, headed for a post office. But I knew we had driven by at least one post office already. Maybe Ed had changed his mind, and had decided to head to the hospital first instead. I was nervous that he wanted to break into ICU, thinking nothing good could possibly come of that plan. We were nearing the highway split where we could either continue into Old Town Fairfax, or we could turn onto 66 East and head into Washington. He was clearly familiar with the area. Was he headed to a post office facility further away from his house in order to keep the FBI guessing about his true location and comfort zone?

We went past the turn for 66 East and continued on. It wasn’t long before I was seeing signs for 123 and 50. We pulled up beside the Bombay Bistro at the intersection, and I thought about the time Dr. Reid and I had been at the Rockville Courthouse in Montgomery County, Maryland. He had taken me out to lunch at the other restaurant location for this establishment. 

I couldn’t remember why we had even been in Montgomery County. I think Dr. Reid had wanted to pull old survey plats for some obscure reason for the Battersea case. The Rockville restaurant location was up the street from the courthouse, in this dinky parking lot. The waitress had mistaken us for a couple when we had entered the restaurant. I suppose that wasn’t entirely out of the realm of possibility. It was a fair assumption. We were of the opposite sex, and close in age, and similar in personality. Dr. Reid loves Indian food. He had analyzed the dishes and picked out all the separate spices and flavors, jotting down notes on napkins which he tucked into his satchel with a happy smile. I had taken home all the leftovers, and Petru had been jealous. He had insisted his jealousy stemmed not from me having had lunch with another man, but because I had partaken of another chef’s work! Petru had sulked all weekend over my betrayal. 

My head jerked up as we went straight, drawing me out of my thoughts. Ed and I were on 123 South, and headed into Old Town Fairfax. We trolled through the winding residential main street area before arriving on the corner where the old brick and mortar courthouse stood on the right side, complete with old cannons and a couple of historical markers. I wondered where we were headed, and why we had approached this part of old town from the opposite direction. Ed clearly knew his way around here. I had no doubt he was familiar with the area. I would have to trust him. Maybe he was driving in circles in an attempt to confuse me. 

We headed up the long hill, and swerved off to the right, down and around a couple other streets. All the municipal buildings and apartments and homes were brick constructs. We went past the new courthouse, which was a beautiful glass and metal structure. It stood out among all these red brick façades. We went past several restaurants, which only reminded me how hungry I was.

“Why don’t you drive?” Ed asked. I shook away my thoughts, and shrugged my shoulders. 

“No need for a car in DC. I can use mass transit or walk to get anywhere I need to go.” 

"Are you one of those tree-hugging dirt-worshipping environmentalists?" he asked with a teasing tone. I frowned at him. "Not that there's anything wrong with that," he added. “I can’t imagine not having a car,” he said. “I would feel so trapped.” 

“My friend Karla in Archives had to pay twenty-five thousand dollars for her parking space at her apartment complex.” 

“That’s obscene,” Ed breathed. “Does Petru have a car?” 

“No. He doesn’t drive either.” 

“I can’t imagine…..” 

“It sure cuts down on impulse buying,” I added, thinking about the big china hutch I had been coveting from the furniture store on the corner near my apartment. As much as I wanted that hutch, the fact I would have to carry it home had prevented me from spending $1500 for a piece of furniture which would have overwhelmed my living space. I decided if I made it out of this alive, I was going to rent a truck and buy that hutch and fill it with all of my grandmother’s old china which was packed down in boxes in storage. 

At the bottom of winding turn, we pulled into the parking lot of a large, modern, brick complex. The letters on the front proudly proclaimed it was the main post office branch for Fairfax. Ed backed into a spot away from the front entrance, and stared with narrowed eyes at the multiple glass doors. He flicked his eyes down to his wrist, straightened his watch nervously with his other hand, and then looked to me. 

“Do you want me to go in?” I asked. He was profoundly relieved by my offer. He fumbled in his pocket and handed me a large stack of bills. I took one $20 off the top and gave the rest back. 

“Get a box. A roll of tape. Some heavy brown paper. A good pen if they have one,” he said. I nodded and slowly got out of the car. 

I wondered as I walked up to the entrance what Ed was going to do without me in the car. I knew he was carrying his gun – a semi-automatic Browning m1910. It was a dated weapon, but surely still effective. Did he have it pointed at me? I glanced back to check. 

He was sitting there watching me with big, puppy eyes. Was he scared I wasn’t coming back? I gave him a tentative wave. After a second or two, he waved back once, and dropped his hands into his lap, looking away. 

Questions and theories and fears and more questions rolled around in my head as I gathered up the supplies that I needed: a box, a roll of clear tape, a cylinder of heavy, brown paper. I snagged a sharpie pen as well. How did a guy like Ed make the transition from a man too timid to enter the post office on his own, to someone who was perfectly willing to blow people to smithereens? What was in the basement of his modest brick house? Why were all the other bedroom doors closed? Who was Lisa, and why did she have her own room? Where was his father? Why wasn’t there food in the house? Where had he gotten plastic explosives? Had he stolen them or had he made them? 

The house. Concentrate on the house. He was single, but the house was a family construct. It must have been in his family. Maybe he had grown up there. But where was the rest of his family? Why shouldn’t I go into the basement? Why shouldn’t I go into Lisa’s room? That house was steeped in so much misery that you breathed it in with every breath. Ed was not happy to be home, and home was not happy for him to be there. So why take me there? Why kidnap me at all? 

God’s plan, I reminded myself, thinking of my granny, my sweet granny, and how blindly she had followed her faith. When she couldn’t explain the good things or the bad things, she always fell back on the ‘mysterious ways’ speech. ‘God works in mysterious ways, April. We can’t know all His secrets. We wouldn’t understand.’

I thought about the last time I had attended church with my granny, standing next to her holding her hand, listening to her sing 'Amazing Grace'. I couldn't hear that hymn and not think of her. 'I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see'. 

I knew several former military veterans in the Bureau, and I had seen first-hand how service during a war could effect someone. The trauma inflicted on you, and the trauma you are ordered to inflict on others, it had a way of leaving a mark on a person’s soul. I wanted to believe that Ed’s trauma had started with his involuntary service in the military, but there was something deeper about his sadness which said he was probably damaged goods long before he got sent into a war zone to learn how to build and defuse bombs. 

The question was: who had traumatized Ed, how had they traumatized him, and why had they traumatized him? My continued survival depended on learning the answers to those secrets, and preferably not learning the hard way. 

The woman in front of me in line had reached the counter. I was sorry that she walked away. She smelled of coffee and sweet rolls, and my stomach growled in protest to the lack of food. The woman’s fancy heels clicked as she headed for the counter. I juggled the items in my arms and waited my turn. Her flashy heels annoyed me. I mean really, who dresses up that much to go the post office? 

The clerk rang the woman up, and she left, stuffing her receipt in her purse. She gave me a disdainful glance as she passed me. I saw myself in the glass, and inwardly cringed. My hair was sticking up. I wasn’t wearing makeup. I looked like I had slept in a duffle-bag. I was wrinkled from head to toe. My borrowed boots clopped heavily as I approached the counter. I looked like I had pulled on the first jeans and shirt in reach right out of bed, or maybe that I had slept in the clothes. I was one set of fishnet stockings away from being the lead singer for a punk-ska-metal band. Or maybe I needed heavy kohl around my eyes first. A nose piercing. A nipple piercing. Ouch. No. When I smiled to myself, the clerk gave me an equally cold glance, and I catalogued his annoyance with an inward shrug. 

This was the manner in which most men my own age treated me because I was not an attractive woman. Either they failed to register my presence – walked past me without a glance; ignored me outright; stepped around me and then ignored me. Or if they were forced to have to engage in conversation with me, as in the current situation where a clerk had to serve a customer, there was always a distinct air of irritation. It was as if I had played a cruel trick on them, making them have to communicate with someone of a lesser social standing. When a handsome man has no choice but to interact with an unattractive woman, he pulls no punches at making her feel her inferiority. 

“Is that all?” he snapped, taking the items and touching matching pictures on his computer screen. 

I suppose the annoyance ran both ways. He was angry he had to interact with me, and I was annoyed that someone whose job entailed touching pictures and selling stamps thought himself so far above a college-educated Federal Agent, merely because he was so elegant and handsome. But that was life, wasn’t it? Pretty people glide through, while the rest of us walk in their wake. 

“That’s everything,” I answered calmly. He didn’t even look back at me. He clicked the total key (also a picture!), and shoved my items back at me a little harder than necessary. The pen bounced off the counter. 

“$12.78.” 

I gave him the $20 bill and bent down to pick up the pen. When I stood up, I saw that he had taken a special pen off the side of his register, and had marked a stroke of yellow across the center of the bill. He gave me a disdainful look as the mark turned light tan. He flipped the bill over and marked it again, and received the same results. 

‘Sure, Sparky. Because the front of the bill is real, but the back of the bill is counterfeit?’ 

I reigned in my sarcastic thoughts, because they weren’t going to get me anywhere. His cash drawer jumped open, smacking him in the hip. He fought for change and bills, put them on the counter instead of putting them in my hand. All the while, his handsome face grew more twisted by his bitter sneer. 

This was why I admired and appreciated men like Dr. Reid. He had never once made me feel like my lack of physical beauty was a cause to treat me like a second-class citizen. And Dr. Reid was far more elegant and handsome than this kid could ever hope to be. 

A hand came over the counter beside me, and picked up the tape and the heavy brown paper. It was Ed. He picked up the box too. I scooped up the change and put it in my jeans pocket, my face burning with shame. I wanted to be out of there as fast as possible. Ed put a hand on my shoulder, and glared across the counter at the handsome boy there. 

" ‘Thank you, ma’am, for allowing me to serve you, and for patronizing my business, and for paying my salary. Have a lovely day”,” Ed said, glaring at the clerk. The clerk gulped audibly, fear creeping into his pale face. 

I swallowed a snicker as I turned and walked for the door. Ed waited at the counter, giving the boy a dirtier look before quietly he followed me. Once we were outside the entrance, I saw why the clerk had turned so pale. Ed had walked inside the post office with his gun tucked into the front of his jeans, clearly visible at his waist. I got in the car. Ed got in the car. He put on his seatbelt, and tucked his gun into the console between the seats. Ed cast another dirty glance at the multiple glass doors. 

“He shouldn’t have been so rude to you.”

I shrugged. “I’m not his type. Clerks aren’t usually friendly. You get used to it. Keep calm and carry on.” 

“It’s not about you being his type. You aren’t my type either. That’s not the point. It’s about simple courtesy.”

“By and large, he acted like most men act around me. I am not attractive by societal standards. The clerk did not wish to give the impression that he was interested in me either sexually or romantically, and therefore he kept me at an acceptable distance by putting the barrier of rudeness between us. No hard feelings.”

Ed blinked at me, and I knew I had struck a chord with him.

“You get used to it,” I shrugged. “It’s no big deal.” 

“You do not have to accept some snot-nosed punk being rude to you. Stick up for yourself. Demand politeness. It’s not about sex. It’s not about romance. It’s about how we’re supposed to behave towards each other in a civilized society. ‘Yes.’ ‘Please.’ ‘Thank you.’ Why is that so hard for kids these days? They all hide behind the anonymity of the internet and spit venom at each other. They get out in the real world, and they act like that’s how they can act there too.” 

I shrugged, tucking my head down. Ed reminded me of my father when he talked that way. My dad always said things like that, like all you had to do was flip a switch and unlearn all the lessons life had taught you about how to behave around others. I had learned my first lesson about my place in society in Kindergarten, when I gave a love-note to Billy Morell, and he shared it with everyone else in class, and they all laughed at me for months because of the gushy and romantic things I had said to Billy. He stayed far away from me the rest of the year, had made fun of my clothes, my face, my voice, my nose, everything about me. He had been repulsed by me, and he had made it perfectly clear to me, even then, that I was not a girl anyone would want liking them. I had had an aversion for any boy named Billy ever since then. Those lessons were not something we could ever unlearn. They are stamped on our soul forever. 

But men like my father, and men like Ed, they have it so much easier than women like me. It’s easy for someone big and strong and hetero-masculine to say ‘stick up for yourself!’ and think it’s possible to do so. They’re older, and physically intimidating, and bigger than most people, bigger than the handsome clerk had been. Socially speaking, that kid at the counter was obligated by pecking order to be polite to Ed whether he liked him or not, because Ed could be a physical threat. But the clerk was in no way obligated to be nice to me - because I was not a woman he wanted to date or marry, or a person who could further his career, or a rich person, or a famous person. I could serve no function either romantic or social or political, and that was why he hadn’t been kind. That’s how it works. 

I changed the subject as fast as I could. 

“It won’t take long to wrap the Prices' things up, and we can mail it from any post office with an automated shipping station. I do that all the time for Dr. Reid.” 

“I suppose he’s rude to you too,” Ed frowned as he pulled out of the parking lot. 

“Dr. Reid? No. He is never rude,” I defended. “He brings me food. That is the primary social cue that he deems me worthy of being part of his pack. He wishes to take care of me, and he actively seeks to prolong my existence by providing me with food, a space by his fire, a corner in his cave, so to speak. That’s how we tell people we care about them – we share our food and our shelter. Dr. Reid does not boss me around, and he does not talk down to me. We work as a team. A team of two. I like that.” 

“Is he nice to you because he wants you sexually?”

“No,” I answered quickly, feeling my face turn red. “No. He’s taken, remember? Agent Hotchner and he are in a relationship. They’re partners. They live together. He’s got jealous eyes whenever I’m around – Hotchner does. Have you ever been around couples that never stop touching each other, even in public? Or those other couples where one of them never stops touching the other? Hotchner is like that. He always has a hand on Dr. Reid’s arm, or on his shoulder, or he’s in his body space, or he’s referencing personal things between them. That’s a social cue for everyone in range. Hotchner wants everyone, but especially me, to know that Dr. Reid is spoken for, mine mine mine, keep your hands off, thank you very much.” 

“Hm. Mm hm,” Ed said. He did know someone like that, but he wasn’t going to tell me about it. “Is Petru like that with you?” he asked. 

"Oh no. Petru is very laid back. We have a great relationship. We’re good friends. He’s not uptight about showing that he owns me, or that he wears the pants.” 

“Wears the pants?” Ed frowned. 

“I sound like my granny,” I laughed. “Coffee. Do you want some coffee? I want some coffee. Let’s get some coffee.” 

“Is Petru a chauvinist pig?”

“Petru?”

“Yes.”

“He’s old-fashioned, but not in a bad way. He’s nice. He’s a great cook. He isn’t scared of intelligent women.” 

“That’s good, but…..”

“But what?” 

“Is he handsome?” 

“I suppose.” 

“Do you find him sexually satisfying?” 

“Um….”

“You don’t talk about him like most women talk about their boyfriends.” 

“Not that it’s any of your business, but Petru and I don’t sleep together.” 

“Oh. Wow. That is pretty old-fashioned.” Ed’s eyes were very wide. 

“I want to wait until we’re married.”

“Wow,” Ed repeated. 

“That’s really kind of a personal question to be asking people,” I growled. 

“Hey, no. I’m not judging.”

“Petru is interested in things about me other than sex. It’s nice, for a change, to find a man like that.” 

“For a change?” 

“I attract bastards. I always have. Guys think being nice makes me a push-over. I attract men who are looking for a woman they can boss around and abuse. Someone to keep under their thumb. They think because I'm ugly and nice that means I’m so desperate for attention that I’ll do anything to keep a man, including let him abuse me. So it’s nice for a change for a man to like me for me, and not care whether or not I’ll sleep with him. It’s nice that Petru doesn’t use my performance in bed as the standard by which to decide if I’m worth spending time around. Petru likes me for me.”

“If you don’t mind me saying so, you seem a touch defensive on the topic.”

“Ed?”

“What?”

“Shut up.”

“Sorry.” 

“Petru likes me for me. He likes me. I like old-fashioned men.” 

“Wow. Okay,” Ed said. “Let’s get some coffee.” 

“It’s nice to be treated like a human being first.” 

“Yes. I agree with you.”

“So stop making it sound like Petru and I are weird because we haven’t slept together.” 

“I’m not,” Ed defended. I glared out the passenger window and crossed my arms over my chest. 

“I’m not a virgin, if that’s what you’re thinking,” I blurted.

“Hey, whoa, wow, okay. That is really more than I want to know about you,” Ed blurted back. “Coffee,” he added. “Let’s talk about coffee.”

“I’d love some coffee,” I replied angrily. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “All I wanted to say was, maybe you and Petru, maybe that’s God’s plan too. Maybe God brought you two together because Petru needs an old-fashioned lady in his life, and you need a real gentleman who is interested in you even if….” 

“Ed, I’m going to hit you if you don’t shut up,” I warned. 

“….if you don’t think you’re pretty.”

I sniffled loudly and glared out the window, wishing we had never gone down this road. 

“April, I’m sorry. Please don’t cry. Every girl is pretty in her own way. Being super pretty isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, you know. You should thank your lucky stars that you aren’t pretty. Pretty can be a bad thing. Too pretty can be a really bad thing. So cheer up. Oh no. Please don’t cry, Lisa.” 

There is was again – Lisa. Who was she? 

“God doesn’t care how pretty you are. God has a plan for you. You only have to listen and follow,” Ed added. 

I kept quiet – a struggle to say the least. It was hard to argue with that kind of blind faith. This wasn’t the time or place to discuss my views on theology or religious beliefs. I didn’t want to upset Ed, and I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. Mostly I didn’t want him to shoot me. But I had a strange fear about having to trust myself to the whims of the faith he placed in the unseen God in his life. 

I wanted to understand but I didn’t dare ask him. Why was he so religious? How many other messengers had he met? How many other people had Ed taken for an emissary from a higher power? I wasn’t mocking his faith, but I wanted to understand his need for the kind of comfort and security. Or was it parental guidance he needed? 

My grandmother’s strong religious feelings had been born of survivor’s guilt. Her entire family had died in World War II, and she had been sent to live with an aunt. My grandmother had thrown herself into religion in search of the comfort and protection she had lost with her mother and father and siblings. Her aunt had amplified that faith into fervor in an effort to control my grandmother. 

Had the same thing happened to Ed? Had he suffered a tremendous loss which had driven him in search of love and comfort, in search of security he did not enjoy on Earth but hoped to find in Heaven? 

There was no way to question Ed about this without upsetting him, or make it seem like I was prying, and unlike him, I wasn’t going to venture down a conversational path that I knew would upset someone! He had such a sadness and guilt about him though—in his eyes, his face, his person. Every time he looked at me, I couldn’t say for sure, but I felt like he was seeing me, but remembering someone else.

Probably Lisa. 

There was a little boy sadness about Ed that troubled me. Len had been like that. Dr. Reid was too. There was something lost and forlorn about Dr. Reid, and about Ed, which made me go into protective mother mode. I do feel like we have a responsibility to look out for one another in this world. I'm attracted to men who need someone to take care of them. Dr. Reid turned on that instinct with me, because I had seen how other men mistreated Dr. Reid, men like John Rockford, men like Doug Eberhard. I had seen firsthand how macho men treated Dr. Reid, and it made me violently angry. 

Beautiful women too - I had seen how Agent Jareau treated Dr. Reid. When she called him in Cryptology - how she talked to him, treated him like an underling. She was by turns affectionate then disdainful, manipulative if she wanted something and then abusive when she didn't need anything from him. I had heard the rumors - that Reid had worshipped Jareau since they first met, and that they had dated once when a supervisor had given them tickets to a football game. The evening had gone badly. Had Jareau been embarrassed to have been seen in the company of a man like Dr. Reid in such a public social setting? Their mismatched social statuses would have been perfectly obvious, maybe even the source of jeers and mockery by others around them? It was clear by how Jareau acted around Reid that she was horrified that he liked her, maybe even angry that he had thought for even one brief second that he could ever possibly be good enough for a woman like her. But she also knew she had that power over him, and she used that mercilessly when she wanted something from him. Then just as quickly, like Billy Morell and me, Jareau push Reid back to a disdainful distance to make it clear she wasn't romantically attracted to him, that she did not see him as husband material. Dr. Reid was deferential to Jareau, but he no longer loved her as he once had. That love had been tempered by the realization of her true perception of him, and by the knowledge that she manipulated him at will, and his love for her allowed her that power. 

Not that Dr. Reid couldn't handle himself. He was learning - slowly, but he was learning. Ed wasn’t frail either by any means. I felt protective of Ed too, in spite of the fact he had broken into my home and pointed a gun at me. It was clear that this hadn’t been his plan—kidnapping me. It was a misunderstanding that he would have undone if he could have. Plan B. Unfortunately, I knew that meant Plan A had been to put a bullet in my head, and I didn’t want him to revert back to his original plan any time soon!

“Coffee,” Ed said, pulling across a couple lanes of traffic and darting into the drive-thru of one of the hundreds of Dunkin Doughnuts franchises which dotted the DC region. “Doughnuts?” he asked hopefully. I dried my face and nodded. “Chocolate? Bavarian? Jelly-filled?” 

“I don’t care,” I mumbled, ashamed for showing my emotions. 

“Where do you go to mail things for Dr. Reid?” he asked as we rode around the drive-thru lane. 

“If I don’t mail them at work, I mail them at Union Station on my way home,” I sniffed. 

“Oh. I like Union Station,” he remarked as the intercom crackled to life.


	10. Union Station

10.5 – Union Station (Nov 23 – 11:30 a.m.)

 

Wrapping the Prices’ personal possessions took no time at all. Ed and I worked well together – I ate a strawberry frosted doughnut as I stuffed the items inside the box, and packed them tight to make sure they wouldn’t rattle around in transit. Ed taped the box closed, and together we wrapped the heavy shipping paper around it. 

I thought about when I was in junior high, and I would help my dad work on the junk cars he kept in the old barn. I would hand him tools, and he would talk to me about school. It had been his subtle way of interrogating me about my life without seeming to be prying. My dad had longed for a son but had had to make do with two girls instead. Jo was not substitute son material - she of the bright smile and brighter mind and shiny hair and pretty face and feminine ways. So Dad had latched onto me, and I was happy for the attention, as the plain child who wasn't terribly pretty or terribly bright or terribly feminine or terribly anything, really. 'Pretty ugly, pretty apt to stay that way'. How many times had I heard that phrase whispered above or around me? My dad had been kind and protective, like he wanted to make up for the way he knew other men were going to treat me because they wouldn't look past my exterior and see me for me. Ed reminded me of my dad in that way, except Ed didn’t want to talk about school or life or anything. He gave me another pink doughnut and smiled sadly at me. 

We wrapped the box as a team. Ed would put out a hand for a piece of tape, and I would tear another piece off, and he would smooth it into place. I was surprised when Ed handed me the pen and turned around the piece of paper which held the Prices’ address. Did he not want the FBI to have a sample of his handwriting? Or did he have terrible penmanship? I dutifully printed the text and gave him back the pen. The package was ready to go. We jumped back in the car. 

Taking the package to Union Station? Such a bad idea.

“Traffic,” I muttered from the passenger seat as Ed pulled slowly through the SSA permit-only parking lot diagonally leading to the front of Union Station.

“What happened to the short-term parking?” he motioned forward. 

“Oh. That. They took it out. Bricked it over. Took out the bushes too. Infidels,” I muttered. “Now you can either park on the side streets or park in the garage.”

“There’s another good reason not to own a car. Parking fees,” he said grimly. 

The car behind us blew a horn as Ed paused at an inconvenient arc of the circle in order to let pedestrians cross. Ed stopped again another ten feet ahead to let a second wave of pedestrians cross, and we were treated to a second round of honking. Ed began to give the driver behind us a very dangerous look indeed. 

“Pull up and right. That’ll take us to the parking garage,” I suggested. Ed followed the long line of taxis around the building, up the ramp on the right, around the tight left turn, through the suddenly narrow space that led along the back of the building and in front of the parking structure behind the station itself. 

We ducked inside and around the cones and signs. Pulled up to the gate. Unfortunately for us, the rude driver from outside had followed us inside. We paused at the gate and waited for a ticket, and he honked again. Ed was breathing heavy now. The gate rose, and we began to troll for a parking space. All the while, Mr. Personality was on our bumper the entire way. 

“Black Friday,” I groaned as I watched a woman totter past carrying a load of packages and a jumbo-sized purse. 

“Christmas shopping,” Ed groaned too. 

“What the hell were we thinking?” I remarked. Ed chuckled, and I felt like I had won a small victory. 

“Where is the mailing center?” he asked. We paused to let someone else cross, and got another brisk honking. 

“Dude….” I whispered, making eye contact with the driver behind us and shaking my head at him. If he had any idea…... “The mailing center is downstairs on the far right from here. Next to the shoe repair,” I answered Ed. 

“Will Vacarros be open?” Ed asked hopefully. 

“Um. No. They’re gone.” 

“No Vacarros?” he lamented. 

“Sorry,” I whispered. 

“Infidels,” he agreed. “Maybe I should drop you off and wait outside,” Ed suggested. I wondered what was wrong. I guess I was also worried about leaving him alone with that angry frown on his face. “Surveillance,” he added, noting a camera in the corner as we drove past. “There’s bound to be an increased presence on a day like today. Guards and cameras both.” 

“I can be in and out quickly. It won’t take any time at all,” I said, not sure if I should agree or not. 

It wasn’t that I didn’t appreciate that Ed might be giving me another opportunity to cut and run, another test to my devotion to my promise to help. It wasn’t that I wasn’t considering it, but there was also a defeated air about Ed, as if he fully expected me to cut and run. I couldn’t walk away now. It wouldn’t have felt right. He needed someone, and he was expecting less than nothing from the entire world, and maybe I didn’t want to disappoint him like everyone else had. 

“Keep circling. We’ll find a spot,” I assured him. 

“Oh!” he exclaimed. 

“No. That’s a handicapped spot,” I chided. 

“You said it wouldn’t take long,” Ed defended. 

“Do you know how many of the FBI’s most wanted have been nabbed for broken tail lights and parking tickets?” I cautioned. 

“Damn it,” Ed muttered, going past the open spot. 

Sure enough, the rude driver behind us swerved in and took it. Ed’s eyes narrowed to dark and brooding slits. 

“He doesn’t look the least bit handicapped to me,” I commented. 

“I can fix that,” Ed growled. 

No,” I said, pointing a finger at him carefully. Ed’s shoulders drooped, and he backed against the driver’s door. The car to our right lit up with red brake lights. 

“Oh!” Ed exclaimed again. “See? God is watching,” he nodded. 

He backed up enough to let the driver out, and turned on his blinker to indicate he had dibs on the spot. It was a prime parking spot. I wasn’t going to argue about the probability that eventually a space would have become available, given time and effort. I wasn’t going to argue that God probably had more important concerns on His plate than finding us a convenient parking spot. 

But then again, what did I know? It might have been nice to be able to see something remarkable and divine in the small happy events that peppered one’s life, to be able to see the hand of God in life’s small victories. In a way, I envied Ed’s optimism that God was always looking out for him. 

We were getting out of the vehicle as the rude driver strode past the back of the car. Ed was smiling again, and not in a nice way. He fell in step behind the driver, a middle-aged man with clean, bright hair and a very expensive coat, and all the slick looks of a politician or a lawyer. I hurried to keep up with Ed as he followed the rude man through the open air concrete walkway and staircase which led to the escalators and down into Union Station itself. 

I closed my fingers on a pinch of fabric on the back of Ed’s black overcoat, and he slowed down. The rude driver hurried down the escalator, casting nervous eyes back, and did everything but run down the steps of the next level, ducking into Union Station and disappearing into the crowd. 

Somewhere in the distance beyond the building, sirens could be heard screaming along a city street. I cocked an ear and decided it sounded like they might be running up D Street. Ed glanced at the ceiling, the pigeons resting above, and a humbled expression crossed his face. I suspected he had read those wailing sirens as a warning from above to behave himself. 

We walked down the stairs and to the next level, taking the packed escalators and crossing the landing, emerging into the second story of Union Station. 

I loved the building – a huge arched masterpiece not dissimilar in layout to many a medieval church. The building itself had been made from tons and tons of marble quarried in New Hampshire or Connecticut, I couldn’t remember which. The entire building was being guarded by the centurion statues which rimmed the vast open space, staring down from above. It felt like walking through a cathedral every morning, a house of worship dedicated to transit and commerce. 

I had my favorite stores – Barnes and Noble, down and far right; Godiva Chocolatier, down and forward. Fire and Ice – so out of my price range, but filled with such beautiful and decorative tidbits. I loved the bath supply stores, and the jewelry stores too, although I rarely bought stuff there. I loved watching people come and go as much as I enjoyed the shopping and the food. Sometimes I would sit upstairs at a restaurant and watch people go by below. I would make up stories in my head about who they were and where they were headed. Why was that girl pushing a suitcase big enough to sleep in? Was she running away to New York City to make it as a star? Where was that man going with two small children? Where was his wife? Were they rushing to join her at some distant destination, or were they running away from her, and this was the last place those children would ever be seen? 

We were at the rear of the station, leading into the MARC train and AMTRAK train terminals. The parking garage itself had been built over the marshaling area for the trains. Union Station had begun as a staging area for moving troops and shipping supplies. In its current incarnation, it served not only as a Metro, MARC, and train terminal but a tourist hotspot and commuter draw, for food and shopping, movies, or a jumping-off point for seeing the rest of the city. Inner city youths also prowled the station, finding it a haven too, a place to get away from the heat or the cold, to play truant from school, to delve into the fantasy that they too could get on any train going anywhere and get away from all of this. 

“You go mail the package. I’ll be here,” Ed promised, parking himself against the wall next to the ticket validation center. He gave me more money even though I had the change in my pocket from the post office in Fairfax. I gave Ed a quick study – would he really stay right there? “I’ll be here,” he promised, pointing to the ground. I nodded, and went set off. 

The mailing station was a twenty-four hour, automated location, which suited me fine, as my work hours could vary at times. It was usually a breeze to ship from here – in and out in a flash, no muss, no fuss. 

I took the marble stairs down through the travel terminals and waiting bays, and around the stores and small restaurants. I glanced up at the third floor to see that the East Street Café was open and packed. I loved their food. Petru did too. I left the floor with the shops and took the escalator down into the huge food court, delighting in the smells that were all around. I wondered if there was enough time to pickup something to eat for us. Although we had had coffee and doughnuts not an hour ago, the food smelled very tempting. 

I decided against it, hurrying towards my task. I dashed past the movie theaters, ducked past the smoothie booth and the pie seller, and then down the hallway to the mailing area. I ducked in, put the package on the scale, and started touching buttons. Then it hit me like a smack in the head. My eyes rose from the screen to land directly on the camera that was inside the mailing station. 

“What’s wrong?” 

I spun around. There was a young woman behind me, tall and thin, and ever-so pretty. I envied her wonderful hair, her beautiful face, her thin frame, her elegant clothes, her adorable French accent. 

“Oh, I…. you have to use a debit card or credit card. I only brought cash,” I rambled. “I left my purse at home. You know, thieves this time of year. You always have to be careful. The less you carry, the better. You can go ahead if you want.”

“What are you sending? You could give me the cash, and I could send it for you,” she offered. 

I blinked in surprise. 

“It’s eight bucks,” I said. She pulled out her debit card and swiped it, tabbed her PIN as I looked politely away. I fumbled for cash and gave her a twenty. “Thanks. I really appreciate it.”

“You’re welcome,” she smiled. I blinked in surprise again. Highly unusual social behavior, for a pretty woman to be kind to me. Where men could be childish and cruel, women were often doubly so. But I didn’t want to doubt or snub my good fortune. 

“Merry Christmas,” I murmured, giving her the other twenty as well and rushing off with my postage sticker and the box. I put the postage on sideways, and dropped the package in the tumble-chute, and fled the scene so fast that I almost lost a boot. I rounded the corner and hurried to the escalator. 

I peered through the open stairs. Ed was not at the ticket validation center. My heart sank. I finished climbing slowly, my heart in my throat. People pushed past me, impatient with my lethargy and blind to my emotions. I held onto the railing and continued to climb. When I reached the correct floor, I looked towards the ticket validation center again. Ed was there. He was holding a little girl, who was putting a ticket into the machine, waiting for the machine to stamp the ticket. 

His face was so sad and wistful, though he was fighting for a smile to put the girl at ease. He set her gently on the floor, and her mother nodded her thanks to Ed before they exited through the glass doors. Ed straightened up, and stepped away from the machine, pacing back and forth. It was clear from his face that he was fighting memories and emotions both. 

When I approached, he looked relieved. He took my arm and hurried out the doors. It was time to go see Dr. Reid at the hospital.


	11. ICU

11.5 – ICU (Nov 23 – 1:00 p.m.) 

 

I was away at American University when my grandmother died. She had a massive stroke while fixing herself a cup of afternoon tea. She had collapsed on the kitchen floor. Her neighbor had found her less than an hour later. I raced back home to New York to be by her side. Granny had lingered in a coma in ICU for a week before quietly drifting away forever. 

Her funeral was a very private affair. She had planned and paid for it years before when my grandfather had passed away. I remembered Granny’s thin hands, how mottled with age spots and bruises and tumultuous years her parchment-like skin had been. Her hands had been so cold, laced across her front in her coffin at her funeral. Her hair, white as snow; her skin, cold as a tomb; her face, serene as Sunday morning; her clothes, totally absurd. She had chosen to be buried in a dress from her youth, and while she could fit into it, it was incongruous, seeing her dolled up as if to go out for the evening, wrapped in an elegant fur stole and peacock blue silk gown. 

I didn’t have one single memory of her ever wearing that gown and fur stole. All my memories of my grandmother involved warm wool sweaters and button-down oxford shirts, sensible skirts and orthopedic shoes like a nurse might have worn. I didn’t know who the woman in the silk gown and fur stole was, but she was definitely not my grandmother. Mom had explained that it was the outfit Granny had been wearing the night she had met Grandfather. She wanted to be buried in it so he would recognize her when she arrived in Heaven. In my opinion, this had not been a valid reason to let your elderly granny be buried in a dance hall dress, but it had been her final wish, so who was I to disagree? 

I had that same eerie, disjointed feeling, peering into Dr. Reid’s hospital room. The person I was seeing was not the person I held in my mind's eye when I thought about Dr. Reid. 

Ed and I had made it into the hospital very easily. We had walked in, examined the directional map, punched the elevator button, and came upstairs. Nothing hard about that. Ed had said it would be easy. 'Look like you know what you're doing, and people will stay out of your way'. Our plan was to walk down the ICU hallway, to pass Dr. Reid’s room, and to linger at a different patient’s doorway for a minute, maybe two, before leaving again by the other set of stairs. 

We walked slowly down the ICU hallway. It was an antiseptic nightmare. I had bad memories about hospitals. The nurse at the nurses’ station glanced up. Ed was carrying a vase of flowers – white lilies and pale pastel pink roses. They had drawn her attention.

“Sir, you can’t take those in a patient’s room. It’s against the rules. I’m sorry,” she said. 

“Oh, I didn’t realize,” Ed replied, handing them to her at once. She set them on the high counter and returned to her work. Ed motioned me to follow him. I went past Dr. Reid’s room carefully and quietly. 

It wasn’t Dr. Reid. It couldn’t be him! He was bald and bruised, and surrounded by white blankets and white bandages. He was narrow as a rail. He had machines hooked up around him, beeping as they recorded every nuance of his continued existence. His thin mouth was crooked sideway with the ventilator tube. His face was bruised and swollen, and his features were almost undecipherable. 

One long hand lay on top of the covers, on top of his waist, I imagined. The heart monitor cord was clipped to his middle finger. His wrist was bound with a hospital ID bracelet, and the blue plastic ring was enormously large on his thin limb. His golden ring was gone. He was never without that ring. What had happened to his ring? 

There were books piled up on the side table, all manner of shapes and sizes. Ed seized on those immediately with all the instincts of a bloodhound. I staggered, and Ed touched my arm. I kept walking. Ed lingered a moment longer. Miserable sorrow and regret clouded Ed’s face. He stared at Dr. Reid, and back at me, and walked past the window-wall of the hospital room. 

We stopped at the end of the hall at the room of a little girl. I stared into her cold, white room, watching the nurse dabbing her small face with a yellow-tinted cotton ball, drawing away moisture and leaving a medicinal stain on the girl’s stitched cheek. There were no flowers here either. No dolls. No bears. No cards. It seemed an unfeeling place for a child to have to stay. 

Ed leaned against the window-wall and gazed at the little girl too. There were tears in his eyes. I read her name plate – Madeline, it said. I wondered if her parents called her Maddy. I wondered why she was here. I wondered what had been on Dr. Reid’s name plate – Spencer? No one ever called him that except his mother. I wondered what had happened to put Madeline in two leg casts. I wondered how she had smashed her face. Car accidents were the leading cause of injury for children her age, between four and six, I decided. Probably a car accident. 

Where were Madeline’s parents? Why weren’t they here with her? Why wasn’t there anyone in Dr. Reid’s room with him? Where was his security detail? 

I glanced down the hallway towards Dr. Reid’s room once more. Ed read my face, read my intent to return that direction. We should not deviate from the plan. I knew that. But I wanted to walk past Dr. Reid’s room again and read what they had put on his name plate. I wanted to scratch out 'Spencer' and write 'Dr. Reid', out of deference and respect. Ed took my arm, and herded me towards the exit, towards escape. 

As the exit door opened, the restroom door opened, and I recognized the young woman who walked out, straightening her uniform and tucking her blonde hair behind her ear before briskly striding back to her post. 

“Spaulding,” I murmured, not loud enough that she could hear, but Ed had heard me. He pushed me into the stairwell and pulled the door closed. We plodded numbly down the stairs and exited into the parking garage. Ed brushed a hand over his face and dragged me to his car.


	12. Mercy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning for extreme physical violence

12.5 – Mercy (Nov 23 – 5:00 p.m.) 

 

“It’s wrong. It’s wrong. It’s wrong,” Ed repeated to himself as we pulled into the driveway and got out of the car. He hustled me up the porch stairs and into the house, hustled me into the living room area. I sat down on the divan, and he paced around the kitchen. 

“I know you feel bad, Ed, but….” I began. 

Ed whirled on me, fists clenched, leaning into my face and shouting.

“IT’S WRONG!” 

“Okay. I know,” I whispered. “Calm down. It’ll be all right.” 

“You don’t understand! I did that! I did that, and now he’s lying there, and he’s never going to be the same, and it’s cruel, and it’s horrible, and I DID THAT!”

“Ed, it’s going to be okay.” 

“YOU DON’T KNOW THAT! You don’t know what God’s plan is!”

“Ed….”

“I have to fix this.” 

“We’re trying to fix it.” 

“No. I have to finish this. I can’t let him lie there like that. I can’t let him live like that.”

“Ed?” I whispered. 

“You don’t understand. I can’t let him linger. He’ll follow me too. Just like Lisa does,” he cried, getting down on his knees and folding his hands together in prayer. “God, I’m so sorry. I meant to kill him. I didn’t mean to make him linger in pain and suffering. It’s wrong to make someone suffer. This isn’t what I wanted. Don’t let this be like Lisa all over again.” 

“Ed, who is Lisa?” I asked, reaching out to put a hand on his shoulder. “Tell me about Lisa. What happened to her?” 

Ed flinched back from me, rose up to his feet, stumbling in fear and loathing and a little panic. 

“I don’t know what happened! I didn’t see anything. I didn’t hear anything. I didn’t see her leave. I didn’t make her leave. Dad said she left, just like Mom left, and I never saw her again. Never saw her. I don’t know where Lisa went.”

“I think you do know,” I whispered. 

“I don’t know where Lisa is. I can’t help her now. I couldn’t help her then, and I can’t help her now, and it won’t do any good to think about Lisa, so shut up about Lisa. Shut up! Shut up!” 

“Ignoring Lisa isn’t going to make her go away.”

“YES! YES, IT WILL!” Ed shouted back, tears on his face, and horror in his eyes. “I ignored her, and she went away!” 

He mimicked rocking, hands over his ears, eyes closed tight.

“Tell me what happened to Lisa,” I pleaded again. 

“YOU SAID I HAD TO MAKE AMENDS!” Ed screamed at me. 

“You do need to make amends. We can start with Lisa.” 

“I can’t fix Lisa. I can’t help her. I can’t unlock the door. The lock is too far off the ground. I can’t reach the lock, and I don't have the key, and I can’t help Lisa, and I can’t stop her crying, and I can’t stop her pain. There’s nothing I can do! But she won’t stop crying.”

“Ed, we can help Lisa. Together we can help her,” I offered. 

“No. I can’t fix Lisa. You can’t fix her either. But what I’ve done to Dr. Reid, I have to fix that. I need to make amends. I have to fix what I’ve done to him. I have to go back to the hospital, and fix what I’ve done.”

“NO!” I shouted back, rising up in alarm when I realized what he was driving at. I got too uncomfortably close into his face. “Ed, you leave Dr. Reid alone!” I warned. 

“It’s wrong to let him suffer. It’s wrong to force him live half a life.”

“You leave Dr. Reid alone!” I shouted. “You leave him alone!” 

“Oh! So it’s okay for you to talk about Lisa, but I can’t talk about Dr. Reid?! Why not? Does it bother you that you can’t help him either?! God wouldn’t want him to suffer, April. It’s wrong to make Dr. Reid suffer.” 

“Did Lisa suffer? Is that what’s wrong, Ed?”

“She suffered. Oh, she suffered. She cried and she cried and she begged, and she called for me, and I couldn’t help her, and she kept crying and crying, and….my father……” 

His face transformed. Anger shot through him like electricity, hot and sulphuric, dangerous. This time I had gone too far. I knew the second our eyes connected. 

Ed’s hand snaked forward and grabbed me by my hair, dragging, pulling, shoving, shaking. He was frightfully strong, stronger than I had ever imagined. I clawed and grabbed at the floor, the lamp, the wall, all to no available. The ominous brown basement door was before me. Ed yanked it open, and pushed me inside the darkness. I stumbled down the wooden stairs and landed on the carpeted floor on my hands and knees. The door was slammed shut behind me. I heard Ed stomp towards the front door, and I heard him leave. 

All I could do was sit on the floor and rock back and forth, fighting with all the images that sprang into my reeling mind. What had I done?


	13. Digging In The Dirt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lyrics are from "Digging In The Dirt" by Peter Gabriel.

13.5 – Digging In the Dirt (Night)

 

_Something in me_   
_Dark and sticky_   
_All the time it’s getting strong_   
_The way of dealing_   
_With this feeling_   
_Can’t go on like this too long_

The lyrics ran through my head. I fought them away as I concentrated on being as quiet as possible, and concentrated on remaining calm too. I had heard Ed come and go twice now, and had heard him pace back and forth in the kitchen. Twice now he had sat at the basement door in the middle of the night, crying my name, the lonesome lament of a frightened child. I hadn’t answered. The sun had set and rose and was setting again. I think it was Sunday evening. 

It wasn’t the lack of food that I found disturbing. Fear had a way of erasing hunger and everything else. After all, this wasn’t the first weekend I had spend locked in a basement. What was there to be so afraid of? I wasn’t afraid. I wasn’t, truly, and yet I was. 

At first I had feared that Ed would find his gun and storm downstairs and shoot me. Or that he would storm down the stairs and rape me. But his fear of coming down into the basement far outweighed any anger he had directed at me. Now I feared he would leave me here to die. My scalp ached, and my head was pounding, but all in all, I had escaped with relatively little injury beyond bruised knees and hands. 

To be honest, Jo and I had hurt one other far worse when we were kids, pulling each other’s hair and kicking each other in the shins. I thought about Jo, and wondered what my sister was doing. There were times when we were close, that I felt we had a great connection, and other times when she could be so cold and unfeeling while observing the world around her for her writing. I wondered how she could turn her emotions off that way. I imagined that she was taking careful notes as the days passed, recording her own feelings about my absence, questioning my parents about their feelings too. That’s usually what she did in tense situations. One never knew when a personal tragedy might be mined for writing fodder. That sounded harsh, but Jo had always been like that. I had no doubt if I got out of this alive, that Jo would, by and by, once enough time had passed, be asking me to describe in exact detail every single thought that had flittered through my terrified brain during the entire ordeal. Terrible to say so, but true. I made the mistake of telling her the truth about what had happened with Todd, and was horrified when she turned it into her first novel. I would have to be very careful what I said to her this time. 

I couldn’t blame Ed for not wanting to come down here. This place was foul and frightful. There were shadows within the shadows. The darkness seemed to breathe. The darkness was angry, and it was hungry, and I was meat. 

As I watched afternoon fade into evening – it was Sunday now, wasn’t it? – I struggled to hold hope in my heart and my thoughts above the terror that was gnawing at me. I was shaking at the prospect of spending another night down here. But night came, nonetheless. Night came in and swallowed me whole. 

I stood up from my place by the stairs and felt along the far wall, keeping an eye on the particular space in the middle of the room which frightened me the most. I needed to find the bathroom again, and that meant treading the raspberry carpet once more. 

In my initial search of the space by morning’s light yesterday – Saturday – I had learned all there was to learn without making a sound. It smelled like urine down here. That was probably my fault. I had found the bathroom yesterday morning – Saturday. It was a small half-bath stuck in the mid-70’s, with flowered wallpaper and a tiny blue commode. I didn’t dare flush. 

I turned on the tap in the sink to wash my hands, and to take a sip from the font. The water had been metallic and sour. I tried to hold off thirst as much as hunger, knowing that to get to the bathroom and to the water, I had to walk past that particular space in the middle of the floor that was most horrible to tread. I didn’t want to tread there anymore than necessary. 

There were cobwebs and layers of dust on the striped and splotchy divan, and on the matching chair with long blonde hairs in the stain in the seat of the cushion. There were bloody hand prints on the chair too. An old console tv lay smashed against the wall. A vase of flowers had been smashed and pieces of glass were left where they had fallen. An ornate bird cage sat in another corner. Its former occupant lay dead in the bottom on top of the decades-old newspaper, no more than dust and feathers and tiny bones. Was someone going to find me like that – shriveled and dead and long gone?

I sat on the steps for hours, not wanting to disturb the dust on the furniture. The steps were scary enough. I kept my hands wrapped around my ankles because I had this irrational fear that something unseen might snatch at me from between the wooden slats. Too many ghosts lingered here. Something foul lurked in the shadows – a sense or a scent or an echo of violence. I couldn’t place what or where or when, but the sorrow and fear that steeped the entire house, it had originated in this dank and terrible dungeon. 

The first night, I had curled up in the middle of the floor, praying for sleep to come, staring at the ceiling, waiting for Ed to return to the house. In the darkness I was ignorant of the significance of my sleeping spot. I was too overwhelmed with concern for Dr. Reid. Part of me hoped Ed would never return, that he would be arrested in commission of whatever horrible plan he had hatched to end Dr. Reid’s suffering. 

Another part of me wished at least for the comfort of another presence in the house, something other than the angry and desperate specter which lurked in this basement. 

I couldn’t help but fear what Ed had might have done to Dr. Reid, couldn’t help but blame myself. But then I found comfort in the knowledge that there were nurses always on duty at the ICU. That nurse had noticed us right away. Not to mention, Dr. Reid’s surveillance team, those people he wasn’t supposed to talk about and that we were not supposed to notice. At least one of them was always near, always looking out for him. A wanted man was not going to be able to walk into an ICU ward and shoot any patient there, let alone a patient who had twenty-four-hour armed security sitting at his bedside. Ed would have to kill the nurse, the guard, and then Dr. Reid. He wouldn’t be able to do that, and what’s more, he wouldn’t want to do that. 

I woke up the first morning, Saturday morning, yesterday morning? studying the ceiling, its uneven, bi-colored, popcorn-textured surface. That’s when it hit me what I was staring at. I had never walked a crime scene in my life, but I knew from watching crime shows on tv what medium-velocity blood spatter looked like. There it was, all over the ceiling and the walls and the furniture. I rolled to my knees and got up off that horrible carpet, heading back to the staircase as if it was an island in the middle of an ocean full of sharks. 

From my perch on the bottom step yesterday morning, I gaped in horror at the carpet, the raspberry red, deep pile, expensive carpet. Within the dusty, plush pile, my shape was visible. Under my shape was a different shape, the tactile haunting of another person’s body, someone who had lain in place in the very spot where I had succumbed to unwise sleep. Whoever had occupied the space before me, they had left not only their shape, but a good deal of their life’s blood as well. Besides the large spill in the middle, long dried but seeped into the carpet, there were footsteps and hand scratches and kick spots and drip spots and all manner of prints. 

I shivered and shook myself, rubbing my arms at the memory. 

In the light yesterday morning, I had explored my prison, my dungeon, my doom. Light the second day had been no more cheerful than the first had been. Details were fading away from me as evening wore on. Second evening. This was Sunday evening. No, Sunday night by now. Or was it Monday? This darkness, this cold winter gloom, I was terrified that I was never going to escape this place. Even if I got out of this alive, this chilly misery would never be gone from my bones. 

I spotted the shapes in the carpet, my own shape and the one that had been below mine. The dirty, dusty brown stains in the carpet. The smashed tv. The dead bird in its dusty cage. The blood splatters on the walls and ceiling. The blood spatters on the furniture. I studied the carpet, and in the darkness, my mind might have been playing tricks on me, for I could easily imagine, I could almost see, next to the hollowed-out spaces, made more deep by my recent foolish nap, I could imagine as I stared at the carpet that there were footprints, heavy and masculine, boots, I wondered, army boots. There were finger marks, small and thin, and there were roll marks in the stains, where someone might have turned onto their stomach, perhaps in an attempt to roll away from the attack? Maybe onto their back, in an effort to kick away danger with their legs? I thought there were twist marks in the footprints, where heavy boots had turned on metal toes, and I could feel, I could almost see, a man – a big man – a scary man who looked like Ed coming back towards the wooden stairs. 

See there! Can’t you imagine it too? Those drips. Those ones which moved towards the stairs, not up the walls, not across the furniture, not back to the middle of the room but away from the middle of the room? In the darkness I could no longer put my eyes on the exactly space, but I would see it in my mind’s eye forever and ever more. 

The large man had stood there seething, holding his cudgel which must have been fairly dripping with blood and tissue. He had stood there long enough that large blood drops had gathered. He had rested the end of his bloody instrument on the ground, can’t you see it? A baseball bat? It was round, like the end of a bat would be. 

I wondered who the man had been facing. Who had been on the stairs? Who had been here when he woke up from the angry place where the mind retreats into when you’re in the act of hatefully bashing someone into submission? Who had been on these stairs, sitting where I was sitting, watching him do what he was doing?

Had it been Ed who had interrupted this crime? 

How had the terrified boy reacted? Surely he had been very young, too young to intervene, to small to help the victim. Hadn’t he said he couldn’t reach the lock to open the door? I glanced back at the door, and knew that from the outside, the lock was shoulder-height. When that malevolent figure had faced him, Ed must have flinched and fled. He must have run upstairs to the safety of his bedroom, hidden in his bed, prayed for the monster to be gone. 

Had Ed’s father attacked and bludgeoned Lisa? Surely she was his sister, and not his mother, though Ed had said his mother had vanished too, hadn’t she? His father had told the boy the mother had left, and the sister had left like the mother had before. His mother was gone, long gone. Now his sister lay not dead but gravely injured, locked in the basement where she lingered in pain and suffering, where she had cried and begged for help, where Ed had heard her, but he could not reach the lock and open the door? How long had she lingered in pain before she died? How long had she cried for help before Ed’s father had returned to finish what he had started? What had Ed’s father done with her body? What had he done with their mother’s body for that matter? I shuddered as I thought about the ill presence under the basement steps. I hugged my ankles tight again. 

If Ed had opened the door, if he had gotten help for his sister, if he had revealed his father for the devil he was, surely that devil would have come back for him too? He would have dragged Ed down into this basement, bashed his head in, and left him to die too. 

I was shaken from my horrid reverie by a sound outside the basement door. 

“April?”

It was Ed. He sounded like a frightened little boy again. Len flashed through my mind again. 

“April? Are you there?”

I don’t know what came over me, but I cleared my throat, and I answered.

“I’m here, Ed.” 

“Are you okay?” 

I didn’t answer this time. I heard him shuffle closer to the wood portal. I had climbed to the top step, doubting myself the entire way up. Whatever happened beyond this door, there was no turning back. But death would be preferable to spending any more time in this haunted oubliette. 

The knob spun. The door cracked open. Ed fled backwards and waited for me to emerge. I pushed the door slowly, and blinked at the light that burned bright in the kitchen.


	14. Reprieve

14.5 – Reprieve ( Nov 26 – 11:00 p.m.) 

 

 

I could not look at Ed for the longest time. I sensed his shape near to me when I came up into the house, and I flinched back from him. He fled from me as well. 

“April, I’m sorry,” he whispered. 

Ed waited for me to sit down on the divan, and then he planted himself in front of me. He sought to put a hand on my bare foot, and although I wanted to cringe away from him, I remained where I was. Ed cradled my feet between his hands, and bowed his head down and stayed still for the longest time. 

“Did you go to the hospital?” I asked, my voice a croak of pain. 

Ed nodded. 

“What did you do?” I asked. 

Ed shook his head no, whatever that was supposed to mean. 

“I want you to come with me. I can’t do this without your help,” he whispered. I shivered from my head to my feet. 

“I’m not going to watch you finish Dr. Reid,” I sniveled, tears falling instantly down my face. “I won’t do it. I won’t.” 

“What does God want from me, April?”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “But I’m pretty damned sure He would not want you to kill an already-injured man.” 

“I thought about blowing up the hospital. But I knew you’d be angry.”

“I would be very angry, Ed.” 

“I didn't want to hurt Madeline either. I thought about turning myself in, but I was afraid no one would ever find you if I left you down there, and I didn’t want that.” 

“Thank you,” I said slowly. 

“I went to the hospital. I went up to the ICU floor. I prayed for guidance, but God wouldn’t answer me. All I could think about was you, and how mad you would be at me.” 

“Ed, all I can think about is you wanting to hurt Dr. Reid, and I can’t deal with that in my head. I’m sorry God isn’t talking to you, but He isn’t talking to me either. God hasn’t talked to me since college, not since Todd, not since…. not since…” 

Oh my word, I was so not going there, not with a stranger who had abducted me out of my apartment at gunpoint and held me captive, a stranger who had tossed me in his basement too. Except Todd hadn't been a stranger. Todd had been my friend, my companion, my soulmate. Had been. 

“It’s okay. Don’t worry. I know what I have to do now. You have to get cleaned up.” 

“Why?” I worried. A thousand horrible scenarios fleeted through my head, starting with ritual cleansing before death. 

“I’m taking you home.” 

This did not make me feel better, because I feared by 'home' he meant Heaven. 

“No, Ed. No. I don’t want to go home.”

“April, you can’t stay here. I have to leave.”

“Ed, where will you go? What will you do?” 

“I’m going to help Dr. Reid, and so are you.” 

“If you harm him, I will never forgive you.” 

“I know you won’t. I know. You’d do anything for him, wouldn’t you?”

“Yes.” 

“I don’t mean to pry, April, but I do think that means you’re in love with him.” 

“No, Ed, I am not in love with Dr. Reid. I care about him. He’s my friend. He’s never done one bad thing to you, ever, nor to me either. He’s a good person, and he’s never hurt anyone, and he doesn’t deserve to die.”

“What do you want me to do, April?” 

“Let Dr. Reid go. Let him live.” 

“He might never recover from what I’ve done. Would he be happy like that? What is he’s a vegetable forever?” Ed asked.

“That’s not for you to decide, Ed, nor me either.” 

“Who decides then?” 

“Dr. Reid does, and God,” I snickered uneasily, wiping my face on my arm, wiping my nose on my sleeve. 

“If you want me to let him live, I’ll let him live. But then what do I do?” 

“Then you can go, and you can live,” I whispered. Ed looked up at me, dark eyes shining with tears. 

“If I let Dr. Reid live, you’ll let me go?” he asked. 

“If you let Dr. Reid live, I will do anything you ask. I’ll do anything, Ed. Anything. I’ll run away with you. I’ll marry you. I’ll kill for you. I’ll die for you. But first, you have to swear that you’ll let Dr. Reid live.” 

“You won’t help them find me?” 

“Who?” 

“The FBI. I saw them at the hospital, that agent you were talking about.”

“Which one?” I puzzled.

“Hotchner. Dark hair. Dark eyes.”

“You saw him? Did he see you?” 

“No, thank God!”

“When did you see him?” I breathed. 

“This morning. I walked through the ICU ward, and there he was, beating the crap out of someone.”

“What? Who? Why?” I babbled. Why would Hotchner get physically violent with someone at the hospital? 

“I don’t know. I hurried down the hall to get away. No one saw me. They were all worried about him. I peeked in on Madeline, by the way, on my way out. She looks better, you know? I was happy about that.” 

“Ed, who was Agent Hotchner beating up?” 

"I don’t know who it was. Some skinny guy who was visiting Dr. Reid. All I know is, it was scary as hell.” 

I knew it must have shaken loose dreadful memories in Ed’s brain about his abusive father, seeing Agent Hotchner beating up on whoever the unfortunate visitor had been. It was hard to imagine Hotchner punching someone for no reason, but it wasn’t as if I didn’t realize I could use this to my advantage. 

“Ed, Agent Hotchner loves Dr. Reid very much. You do not want to make him angry. You don’t want him punching you, do you? If you try to hurt Dr. Reid, Agent Hotchner will come after you. You don't want that, do you?”

“No!” Ed exclaimed. “So I know what we have to do now. I know what I have to do, anyway. You have to take a shower and get cleaned up, and I’m going to take you home.”

"Take me to the hospital," I pleaded. "I want to see Dr. Reid." 

"Well, okay, I'll take you to the hospital if you want, but then I have to leave." 

“What are you going to do?” I fretted. 

“I’m going to let Dr. Reid live, and you’re going to let me live, and Agent Hotchner is never ever going to know where I live. Okay?” 

“I won’t tell Agent Hotchner anything,” I agreed. "I swear I won't tell." 

“I got some clean clothes for you. I hope they’re the right size. Go take a shower,” he nodded, moving away from my feet and letting me stand up.

“You’ll be right here?” I questioned. 

“Right here,” he nodded, sitting back against the divan and picking up the book that had been on the cushion. It was a glossy black volume with a well-worn spine. The faceplate in the front read 'Patricia Trovinger'. I wondered who she was. Ed turned the thin, onion-skin pages and began to slowly mouth words. “ ‘To every thing, there is a season’.” 

As I walked towards the bathroom, and the waiting shower, Ed’s words and his voice blended with my grandmother’s voice in my head. 

“ ‘To every thing, there is a season, a time to every purpose under Heaven. A time to be born, and a time to die; A time to plant and a time to reap; a time to kill and a time to heal; a time to break down and a time to build up; a time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to get and a time to lose; a time to rend and a time to sew; a time to keep silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate; a time for war and a time for peace’.” 

The quote was from Ecclesiastes, and it had been one of my grandmother’s favorite Biblical verses.


	15. Resurrection

15.5 – Resurrection (Nov 27 – 12:00 a.m.) 

 

“Ed?” 

“Yes, April?” 

“Are you sure about this?” 

“Yes.” 

“You’re not going to back out of our deal?” 

“Do you want my jacket?”

“No. You’ll be cold. You are not going to back out of our deal, are you, Ed?”

“No, April. We have a deal. You gave me your word. I gave you my word.”

“Take care of yourself.” 

“I will.”

“I don’t want to have to worry about you, Ed.” 

“Don’t worry, April. I’ll be fine. I know what I’m doing.”

“Ed?”

“What?” 

“Thank you.” 

“Thank you,” he replied, getting up from the bench. “Sorry I forgot to get shoes,” he said. 

“It’s okay,” I replied, staring down at my feet as Ed got into his sad little Honda and drove away. I took a deep breath, and stared out into the night beyond the bright lights of the emergency bay and the elegant curves of concrete which marked the street from the entrance. The wind was cold, but refreshing. The night air smelled clean. 

I wondered how long I should wait to go upstairs. I wondered if they were even going to let me in. I knew if I sat there too long, though, someone was bound to come outside and check on me. Besides, it was getting chilly. I got to my feet and padded inside, feeling like every eye in the place turned to look at me as I crossed the cold tile floors, heading instinctively for the elevator. 

Hospitals always made me think of Heaven, white and cold and clean and terrifying. Did Heaven have a ‘no shirt, no shoes, no service’ policy? I couldn’t help but wonder as I rode up the elevator with a nurse in scrubs and a doctor in a lab coat both giving me odd looks. 

“If you’re looking for podiatry, they’re on the second floor,” the doctor said as she stepped out. 

“Thank you,” I said. Why had she broken the social code of never talking to strangers in the elevator? I supposed because nothing screamed for help louder than a barefoot woman with frazzled hair wandering your hospital after midnight? 

When I got out of the elevator on the ICU floor, my heart caught in my chest. The same nurse was on duty from a few nights ago. The vase of white lilies and pale pink flowers flourished on the counter. I saw them, and my heart wept, and I thought about Ed. 

Please, God, if You’re out there, watch over Ed. He needs You. 

I nodded to the nurse as I went past, and she nodded back. I paused for a moment, and glanced down the hallway towards Madeline’s room. A brown haired woman was hobbling towards the doorway, limping along on a crutch and a cast. She beamed like a radiant sun when she finally stood in the portal.

“How’s Mommy’s angel? Are you up past your bedtime, Maddy? Did you wait up because you knew I was coming to see you?” she exclaimed loudly. A muted, mumble came in reply, and although I was too far away to hear the words, I was sure it was Madeline replying. The woman beamed even more brightly and hurried inside, closing the door. I turned my attention back to Dr. Reid’s room. Spaulding stood up from her chair and came to the door when she recognized me. 

“How is he?” I asked. Spaulding was as white as a ghost. She took my hand, and led me to her chair. I hadn’t realized I was shaking until I sat down. 

“Agent Davies, how are you?” she asked. “Are you okay? Do you want me to call someone? Do you need help? NURSE!?!” 

“No. I’m fine. I want to sit for a second. How is he?”

“I’m going to call someone for you. Stay right here,” Spaulding said, taking out her phone. She was already dialing in spite of my protests. It didn’t matter. She stepped into the hallway, keeping her voice low. She walked directly to the nurses’ station and put a card down in front of the nurse there. The nurse stood up with a gasp, and gaped at me. She moved the vase of lilies and roses, and put the phone on the counter, and started dialing as fast as she could. 

I stared at Dr. Reid, and I waited. I reached out and touched his closest hand, and I waited. I found the machines unnerving, cold, and demanding.

Spaulding returned, closing the door. 

“They’re on their way.”

I think she meant for that to be comforting, but it was not. I was floating, feeling nothing, but feeling everything at once. The lights were too bright, and the machines were making me queasy. The sight of that metal needle in Dr. Reid’s thin hand frightened me. My grandmother’s hand had looked like that – frail and pale and bird-like. But all I had to do was look down into Dr. Reid’s peaceful face, and I knew I had made the right decision, that I had done the right thing. 

Spaulding was hovering next to me. Maybe she feared I meant to hurt Dr. Reid. Nothing could be further from the truth. 

“Do you want your chair back?” I asked her. She quickly pulled up another seat, settled it beside mine, and kept an eye on the glass wall and the door. I got the impression she was guarding me as ardently as she guarded Dr. Reid, and I found comfort in that feeling. 

Three figures popped around the corner and came to a screeching halt. The youngest man looked familiar. I think he was the agent who had questioned me a few days ago about Bernie’s shooting. I looked at him once, and looked away again. I wanted to keep them at bay long enough, but long enough for what, I wasn’t sure. Long enough to be sure Ed had time to get away? Long enough to be sure Ed wasn’t coming back to blow the hospital to dust? The young unit chief was dialing his phone. I wondered who he was calling.

“Do you want to talk to them?” Spaulding asked quietly. 

“I’d rather talk to Agent Hotchner. Do you know where he is?” I asked. 

“I’ll find him for you,” the guard replied. She pulled out her phone and made another call. 

It wasn’t a long wait after that – fifteen minute, tops. Three more figures leapt out of the elevator, and this time, instead of merely glaring at the window, Spaulding got up and went to the door. I followed her with my eyes, and held my breath. 

Agent Hotchner was gaping through the glass at me. I was the last person he had expected to ever see alive again. It showed in the wonder on his face. In direct contrast, Jack was peering around Hotchner’s side, not looking at me, but staring at Dr. Reid, and his small face was filled with horror and disbelief. I wanted to cry when I saw the look on Jack’s face. 

Another agent was with Hotchner, SSA Derek Morgan. He was the one who had been teaching Dr. Reid fighting techniques in the gym that day in late summer, when Agent Eberhard and Dr. Reid had gotten into that fight. Dr. Reid had been so mortified. But I thought about the way he had mustered his dignity, straightened his disarrayed and bloodied clothes. He had walked away from the hoard of onlookers who had witnessed him getting beaten and dragged all over the floor by that over-bearing jackass, Doug Eberhard. Dr. Reid's display of dignity that day, in the face of public humiliation, that had stayed with me. I hoped I could match his example in the days to come. 

Life wasn’t about how many times you got knocked down. Life was about how many times you got back up.


	16. Fallout/Shelter

16.5 – Fallout/Shelter (March 1 – 10:00 a.m.)

 

I could hear their voices before I could see them. I had been expecting them all day. My case had been splashed all over the news again this morning, my first day back at work. I had rearranged my shifts to be in as early as possible in order to be gone as quickly as possible. It was the best way to cope, the best way to avoid confrontation with my fellow agents who were treating me worse than a dirty snitch from Internal Affairs. 

“Reid, this isn’t what you should be doing, not on your first day back, that’s all,” Agent Hotchner was grumbling. I heard a soft deep laugh in reply. “Don’t you take that tone with me,” Hotchner muttered. 

“What tone?” Dr. Reid asked innocently. 

“You don’t know how many times I’ve questioned Davies. Morgan too. Schultz has. Dr. Lind has. Garcia tried too. Privately. Separately. Jointly. On-site. Off-site. We’ve done everything reasonable to give Davies a chance to cooperate.”

“Hotch.”

“You’re not going to get anywhere with her either, you know, smart ass. I don’t care if she is in love with you.” 

“Aaron, this is not a competition.” 

They paused two shelves away from me. I could see their legs through the rows of books. I stood up and peered through the upper shelves. Dr. Reid was kissing Agent Hotchner, the last and best way to silence his grumbling partner. It was like watching two beasts through a thicket of trees, like a primate sociologist in the wild. Reid had a thin fist clenched tight in Hotchner’s red tie, and he was pulling the larger, heavier agent off-center in order to plant the smooch. Heavier was right! Hotch had put on at least ten pounds. It looked good on him though, made him more intimidating than ever. 

The golden ring on Reid’s left hand caught my eyes. It had returned, and it had been joined by a second golden ring with a blue-green stone in it. Reid pulled away from the kiss and smiled at the befuddled and grumpy Agent Hotchner. Hotchner straightened his tie with his left hand. A matching golden ring glinted on his ring finger. 

“Stay here, and don’t snap at anyone while I’m gone,” Dr. Reid whispered, patting Hotchner’s chest and hurrying away. 

Reid circled around the shelves seconds later. I hadn’t had enough time to duck around the other end and get away from him. In the last two months, he had called and emailed me on a weekly, almost daily basis. He had invited me to coffee, to dinner, to breakfast, to tea, to a hockey game, and to the petting zoo, and I had steadily but politely avoided him. I guess it was inevitable that he would get the drop on me sooner or later. I could have broken into a run to get away today, but it would have been silly to attempt to flee across the library to get away from him. And I was actually glad to see him, up close and personal, because it had been too long. 

The Cryptology Department was no more. We had all been reassigned. The department workload had been farmed out to Fort Meade and the NSA. Agent Rabovsky had returned to work as an assistant assistant-director in the White Collar Crimes Unit. I had been allowed to return to Archives and Library Services. Dr. Reid had been allowed to return to the Behavioral Analysis Unit. I don’t know where Hilda went, and I really don’t care. Hopefully nowhere that she could eavesdrop on other people's private lives and record their conversations. Or maybe the Brass had had an inspired thought, and they had sent her to the phone surveillance unit? It was as if none of the dreadful events that had caused our disbandment had ever happened. 

Except they had, of course. The fallout had been devastating. Captain Matts Magnusson was dealing with losing his leg and having his infirm condition force him into retirement. Hon Kirk was raising her newborn son in Hawaii – widowed, alone, and in mourning. Dr. Rockford, Dr. Ramirez, and Dr. Larsson all got plaques with their pictures in the Hallway of Lost Souls, but no one ever mentioned them again after that, and certainly no one brought up the awful truth about how they had lost their lives. Rabovsky continued to struggle with nightmares and a fear of loud noises, but the Major had returned to his shadowy world of CIA subterfuge at her insistence. I hadn’t slept a whole night through since my abduction, in spite of what I was telling my therapist. 

Dr. Reid could still read 20,000 words a minute and speak six languages, and he had profiled the asses off the Brass who were desperate to plant him in an obscure and safe desk job for his remaining tenure at the Bureau. They had not gotten their way. He had been allowed to return to the BAU, under Agent Hotchner's protective aegis. Unfortunately though, Dr. Reid had failed his firearms recertification so spectacularly that he wasn’t going to be allowed to retake it for another six months. 

What’s more, according to my only remaining friend in the Bureau, Karla in Archives, Dr. Reid couldn’t walking a straight line without tripping over his own feet. Not that he had been any great shakes with physical tasks beforehand, but now, if rumors were to be believed, he could barely walk a straight hallway without hurting himself. Continued physical rehabilitation therapy would remedy his coordination deficiencies but he was going to have limited mobility for quite a while. 

“Agent Davies, do you have a few minutes?” Dr. Reid asked cordially, gently, professionally. He leaned on the shelves with one hand and his cane with the other. 

“Yes, sir,” I said as I gave a half smile. “It’s good to see you.”

I clenched my teeth to keep from adding, ‘up and around’. His attention fell immediately to the cart of books I was pushing around. 

“You too, stranger. Oooh,” he purred, rubbing the spines of the books, stroking his favorites. This was the physics section, after all. It was like teasing a hungry horse with fresh oats. 

“I heard on the news about the explosion in Fairfax,” I said, picking up another book to shelf. 

“Yes,” Reid replied. “That’s why I’m here.” 

“Was it Ed’s house?” 

“Records indicate the house belonged to Michael Trovinger, and with his death last year, it passed to his son, Edward.” 

“I’ve been expecting this for some time,” I replied, climbing the ladder to put a particular book back where it belonged. Dr. Reid reached up a hand to help me back down. “Was Ed there?” I asked. 

Dr. Reid paused, hand on my arm, watching me closely. 

“No,” he answered. The relief must have shown on my face. 

“Good. But the news said two bodies were found. I assumed….” 

“Two bodies were found. Neither of which belonged to Ed Trovinger,” Reid answered. “You feared he meant to commit suicide. Is that why you haven’t revealed where he might have gone? You meant to give him ample time to find his own resolution.” 

“I don’t have any idea where he would have gone, except home, but he didn’t like that house. There were too many ghosts. It wasn’t home to him. It was Hell.” 

“We did find two bodies,” Reid whispered, helping me climb the ladder again, handing me another book. “Skeletal remains.”

“Male or female?” I asked. 

“Female. Both. Partial remains. The blast destroyed much of the structure, but we were able to recover two people.” 

“Was it Lisa?” I asked. Dr. Reid granted me a broad smile. It was a beautiful sight. 

“So you know about her? In researching Ed Trovinger's background, we discovered that his older sister Lisa Trovinger disappeared in 1982. Her body was never found. We do believe that one set of the remains belongs to her.”

“Where was she in the basement?” I asked. 

“She was buried in a crawlspace under the stairs.”

I clutched his hand and nodded vehemently. 

“Yes! Under the stairs!” 

“The other set of remains was recovered had been buried under the concrete floor itself, which was blown apart by the blast. Our theory is…” 

“The other skeleton is Ed’s mother?” 

“Yes. Patricia Trovinger was last seen in 1973. Odds are that the second set of remains belongs to her.” 

“I know what the Suits are thinking, but it wasn’t Ed who killed them.” 

“The cause of death for both women was a shattered skull and then manual strangulation.”

“It wasn’t Ed. It was probably Ed’s father.” 

“Michael Trovinger?”

“Him. Yes. He did it.” 

“How are you?” Dr. Reid asked, handing me another book. 

“Fine,” I replied. He knew I was lying. I refused to let him change the subject. “Ed’s father killed the mother and the sister. He must have. He killed them, not at the same time, but surely it was him, not Ed.”

“Have you been seeing a therapist?” Dr. Reid asked. 

“I had to agree to therapy in order to be reinstated. I will have weekly sessions for the foreseeable future, until my SSA says otherwise. Dr. Reid, you have to believe me. Ed didn’t kill his mother or his sister. He loved them. He wouldn’t have killed them.” 

“Loving someone does not negate the ability to harm them. Nine out of ten women who are murdered are killed by their boyfriend or spouse or male family member. However, Patricia Trovinger disappeared in 1973, making it inconceivable that Ed Trovinger could have been responsible for her death. He would have been less than a year old at the time. As for Lisa Trovinger, Ed would have been ten at the time of her death. He was unlikely to have had the physical strength to strangle his sister, let alone bash in her skull. I agree with you, Agent Davies. Ed Trovinger was not responsible for either death.” 

“He had survivor’s guilt. They haunted him. His sister more than his mother. I don’t think he ever knew for sure what happened to his mother. The father, I think he might have attacked Lisa in front of Ed. I believe he must have. Ed was present when the father attacked Lisa, and he was scarred forever because he couldn’t help her, either during the attack or afterwards.” 

“You’ve given this a lot of thought.” 

“I can’t close my eyes without seeing his face,” I whispered. “When I dream at night, I see that basement. I spent three days locked in that basement.” 

“In which case, I should very much like to walk you through a cognitive interview, if you’re willing, when you’re willing.” 

“You of all people know the deal that I made, Dr. Reid,” I whispered. “I will not help you capture Ed Trovinger.” 

“I am not ignorant of the deal that you made, nor am I ungrateful,” Dr. Reid insisted. “However, I do not believe you would be betraying any bargain you made with your abductor if you were to aid me in an effort to solve the crimes that were committed against his mother and his sister. How is Petru?” Dr. Reid asked. I frowned at him coldly. 

“We broke up. He returned to Romania, which you wouldn’t be asking about if you didn’t already know.”

“May I ask what happened between you?” 

“We had a falling out.” 

“Clearly. Was it over the abduction?”

“No. Actually it was over my miraculous return.”

“Why would you quarrel over your safe return?” he asked, tilting his head. 

“Curiously enough, I don’t think Petru was comfortable with the idea that I wasn’t more traumatized.” 

“I don’t understand.” 

“Neither do I. He kept telling me that I could tell him everything that had happened. But I had already told him, you see? When there wasn't more to tell..." 

"He did not believe you had not been..." Dr. Reid paused, considered his word choice, and looked terribly embarrassed. "More traumatized," he whispered. 

I nodded. "There wasn't anything to tell, and he couldn't believe nothing had happened, so Petru concluded that I had been willingly unfaithful. He believed the reason I wouldn’t help the police and the Bureau capture Ed was because I was in love with my kidnapper.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Nothing happened, Dr. Reid. But Petru wouldn’t believe me. He accused me of lying to him, he called me a whore, and he slapped me. I told him to leave and never speak to me again. I haven’t seen him since.” 

“I’m so sorry,” Dr. Reid lamented. 

“Why? It’s my own fault. I should have known he was too good to be true. I will be more cautious in the future.” 

“Agent Davies, it’s not uncommon for situations like this to come between a couple. When one party has been the victim of a criminal offense, and the other party can’t relate to what they’re feeling emotionally,” Dr. Reid offered feebly. I wanted to hug him for his valiant efforts to make me feel better. 

“Perhaps we should leave it at that,” I agreed. “So, Ed blew up his house this morning? What took him so long? Good for him. He should have blown it up years ago, with that son-of-a-bitch father of his inside.”

“The bomb fragments at the scene are consistent with the bomb fragments recovered from the other crime scenes,” Dr. Reid replied. “There is no doubt that Ed Trovinger was responsible for the explosion this morning. That puts him in the area as late as 5:00 a.m.”

“Unless he used a timer.”

“Agreed. It is also possible that he used a timer.” Dr. Reid’s hazel-brown eyes filled with cunning, palpable and dangerous. He might have been temporarily physically disabled, but his brain was as sharp as ever. He deduced at once that I would never have mentioned a timer if I hadn’t seen a timer, and I cautioned myself to be more judicious about my word choice. 

“Did you find any books?" I asked. 

Dr. Reid's smile grew wider. "Not a single page, not a single book, has been found on scene."

"He didn't get all those in his car," I decided, and cursed myself again when wheels turned faster behind Dr. Reid's calm, shrewd face. 

"It would seem that Ed is in the wind once more,” he said.

“You know, Dr. Reid, for all his failings, for all his sins, for all his crimes, Ed Trovinger never slapped me in the face, and he never called me a whore.” 

“I know you’re struggling with how you should feel about your abduction and your abductor.” 

“Tell me how it felt.” 

“How what felt?” Reid asked simply. I stood against the bookshelves and closed my eyes. 

“You are one of the few people who actually does know what I’m going through, because you’ve been there too. Tell me how you feel about Tobias Hankel. Do you still struggle with what happened then?”

“Yes.” 

“It’s more than that, though, isn’t it? You’ve taken on this overwhelming feeling of guilt because somewhere down inside, you feel like you failed him,” I mourned, staring at him to see if he agreed. He nodded slowly. 

“During the course of my confinement, I grew to understand some of what was going on inside Tobias’s mind. It was survival instinct more than anything. I learned everything I could learn, and I sympathized with him out of the desire to keep him from killing me, but also because I felt sorry for him too. If I had only been dealing with Tobias, it might have been possible to save him. Unfortunately, that isn’t how it worked out,” Dr. Reid murmured. 

“Were you in love with Tobias Hankel?” 

“Unequivocally, no. I cared about him as a wounded human being who needed help. My feelings were in no way romantic or sexual.” 

“I don’t have romantic feelings for Ed either, but no one believes me when I tell them that. Including Petru. I feel pity for Ed. I feel sad for him. I feel like underneath it all, he’s not a bad person, and I wish I had been able to better help him.” 

“That’s perfectly understandable.” 

“You would be the first person to say so,” I chuckled. 

“April, I’m not asking you to help me find Ed Trovinger. I’m asking you to help me solve Lisa Trovinger and Patricia Trovinger’s murders. By doing that, maybe we will both come to a better understanding of what’s going on in Ed’s head. Where I go beyond that, I will not ask you to lead or to follow. Once you help me solve these murders, I will ask no more of you, no more than you are willing to give.”

“I don’t understand Ed any better than you do,” I sighed impatiently. “You’re the profiler, Dr. Reid. I’m a librarian.” 

“Don’t you ever under estimate yourself. You survived a harrowing situation, against all odds and all reason. Who better than you has had a view into Ed’s world, into his mind? How many times since he released you has he contacted you?” Dr. Reid asked. 

“Twice. He sent me a teddy bear for Christmas. A few days ago, he mailed me a second package. He’s been doing his research. He knew it was my birthday,” I admitted.

I heard Hotchner gasp from the end of the shelves where he was lurking. He whirled as he swelled with fury, like a ferocious hound who wanted to grab me in his mouth and shake me senseless. He took one step towards us, and Dr. Reid shot him this warning look that said in no uncertain terms that he had better keep his distance. Hotchner breathed hard, but then he wilted, clenched his fists in frustration, and went back around the corner. 

‘Good dog,’ I thought to myself. 

“Has Ed been stalking you?” Reid asked me. 

“Goodness no. But he did find out where I moved. My dad wanted me to come home to Syracuse. I only went as far as Dale City. I wanted my job back. Thank you, by the way.” 

“I don’t know what you mean,” Dr. Reid blushed wonderfully. 

“Of course you don’t,” I whispered back. “Thank you anyway.” 

“I had no hand in your reinstatement.” 

“But you spoke up for me, and the Brass listened to you. Accept my gratitude, and stop being so modest, butthead.” 

“What did Ed send to you for your birthday?” Dr. Reid smiled. 

“Some of his favorite books, a box of Godiva chocolates, and an apology. There seemed a finality to the gesture. I had thought he was saying his last goodbyes.” 

“May I examine…” 

“No.” 

“I could subpoena…” 

“You could, at the risk of my eternal disgruntlement,” I growled. There was no way I was going to show Dr. Reid Ed’s letter, not when the bulk of the four-page missive had been Ed encouraging me to unlock my heart and spill my feelings to Dr. Reid because I was obviously in love with the man, and we were meant to be together. Ed had even gone as far as offering to 'get rid of the competition' for me, and by competition, I know he meant Agent Hotchner. No, Ed, no. Not a good idea. Not now, not ever, especially not when Dr. Reid and Agent Hotchner were wearing what could only have been wedding rings. I wondered what the blue-green stone was. It must have some kind of symbolic significance. My soul filled with happiness and misery at the same time. I wanted that kind of connection with another person. Perhaps someday I would find the right man for me. But I wasn't going to rip apart Dr. Reid's happiness for my own gain, not after all he had been through. I was happy to consider him a friend and nothing more. 

Dr. Reid backed down. He gave me another book, and gently pushed the ladder along the rails on the shelves until I was in the appropriate place. I was close enough to the end of the line that I could see the top of Agent Hotchner’s head. He turned around and faced me, gave me a dirty stare, and then looked away again, pretending he wasn’t hanging on every word of the conversation between Dr. Reid and myself. 

“I’ll help you solve Lisa and Patricia’s murders if I can. But I won’t help you find Ed Trovinger.”

“Thank you, Agent Davies,” Dr. Reid replied. "By the way, do you remember Madeline Hobble?" 

I pondered for a moment. "Madeline from ICU?" I asked. 

"Yes. She was down the hall from me. The nurse we questioned said you and Ed stood at her window, and she thought you were there to visit the child."

"Yes, I remember Madeline." 

"I thought you'd want to know that an anonymous benefactor donated $250,000 towards her hospital bills," he murmured.

I started to chuckle as a proud smile sprung up on my face. Almost as quickly, I also wanted to cry. I had to struggle to stifle the sounds. Dr. Reid put a hand on my arm. 

"No one is beyond redemption," he whispered. I nodded quickly and enthusiastically, drying my face. I turned around and headed the other direction with my books. “Oh, be careful. That shelf has a scratch in it. I wonder who put that there,” Dr. Reid smiled, running his fingers along the long-weathered gash in the wood. He let go of my arm, and caressed the wood and all but nuzzled the books there. I reached up to touch the shelf as well. 

“Call me later, sir, after my shift is over. We’ll arrange a time and place. Not at work. Not in the box. Is that okay?” I asked. 

“If I call later, will you answer?” he asked pertly. “Do I have your correct phone number? I am beginning to wonder.”

“You do have the correct number. Sorry I’ve been avoiding you. I will definitely answer if I know it’s you calling,” I promised, taking my cart and pushing it before me as I walked away. “Sir,” I said as I passed Hotchner. He gave me a pouty dark look and continued on. 

I stopped at a table to pick up a couple books which had been left lying around. I glanced back towards the stacks and shelves. Dr. Reid was stretching up, trying to reach a book that was beyond his fingertips. Agent Hotchner pushed the ladder towards him, holding it steady on both sides. 

“I can’t believe you got her to agree to talk to you, you tricky bastard,” Hotchner said as he watched Dr. Reid stare at the ladder, befuddled and confused. “It’s okay, baby. It’s not hard. Left, right, left,” Hotchner said. 

“Left, right, left,” Dr. Reid repeated, picking up one foot, then the other, climbing slowly. Hotchner braced Reid with a hand in the small of his back. Reid grasped a tome off the upper most level, and held it tight to his chest as he descended sloppily. 

“That’s it,” Hotchner whispered, patting him on the back and keeping his thin frame steady. 

“Galileo’s Discourse on Falling Bodies,” Dr. Reid purred happily, holding the book close to his chest like an old friend. “Do you remember this place?” he asked, with large eyes and a hopeful smile. Hotchner grinned boyishly in reply. 

“Do I remember?! We met right here, right on this spot, almost fourteen years ago.”

“You do remember then?” Reid whispered, touched. 

“How could I ever forget? You may even be wearing the same clothes!” Hotchner smiled, caressing Reid’s right eyebrow. 

“I most certainly am not,” Reid protested. 

“You were climbing around, talking to the books. Gideon grabbed your leg to get your attention. You screamed and fell.”

“I did fall, but I did not scream,” Reid pouted. 

“You screamed. You wailed. You all but shrieked. You smacked this shelf on your way down, and then damned near killed Jason Gideon with this very ladder. I have one question for you, Dr. Reid?”

“What’s that, Agent Hotchner?”

“Did it hurt when you fell from Heaven, angel?” Hotch asked with a charming smile and half-lidded, bedroom eyes, touching his nose to Reid's nose. 

“I can’t believe you said that with a straight face,” Reid moaned in anguish at the corny remark, but he was smiling broadly. 

Hotchner’s laugh was deep and rich. Several other patrons turned to stare at Hotchner and Reid. Theirs was hardly appropriate comportment for the library, but I smiled because I didn’t mind. It was so nice to see them happy together after all they had been through. I cast another careful glance in their direction. 

“Bring Galileo along. You can read to me on the way to Fairfax,” Hotchner said, giving Reid his cane and guiding him towards the library exit.


End file.
